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Prentice tries to reconcile “security” and “prosperity” at Council of the Americas annual meeting May 9, 2008 On May 7, Industry Minister Jim Prentice, who is also the minister responsible for pipelines, was in Washington to address the 38th Council of the Americas Annual Meeting. This is the group that acts as the U.S. co-secretariat, along with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, for the North American Competitiveness Council (NACC). Our Industry Minister joined U.S. President George Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, among other top U.S. officials at the conference, which “brought the issue of trade policy into focus, with all speakers emphasizing the importance of open markets in the region,” according to the official website. “I want to thank you for strengthening the ties between peoples – our NGOs, our teachers, our students, and our business communities,” said Rice in her address. “ I want to thank you for your tireless efforts to educate about our hemisphere and to push for our common interests.” That’s a bit rich considering the somewhat exclusive audience – corporate members include Exxon-Mobil, Coca-Cola, Shell International, Kissinger McLarty Associates, and Wal-Mart – and the fact that in North America, the CEOs of the NACC have been the only ones granted access to the details of the Security and Prosperity Partnership. It also gives new meaning to the word “partners” in Prentice’s statement to the conference that “Canada's Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, has made re-engagement with our partners throughout the Americas a top priority of the Government of Canada.” Is he talking about political or corporate partners? Experience with free trade and then the SPP tells us that the input of the latter carries as much and sometimes more weight than what our elected officials say. And so it is telling that Prentice would decide to address this crowd—his government’s “partners” in the corporate battle to make North America more “competitive.” Here’s what our Industry Minister told his American audience this agenda requires: NAFTA has been overwhelmingly positive “In 1988, Prime Minister Mulroney and President Reagan made a great experiment in trade liberalization when they negotiated the Canada–U.S. Free Trade Agreement,” said Prentice. “It was expanded in 1994 when Mexico became the third partner in the North American Free Trade Agreement — NAFTA... And the results have been positive — overwhelmingly positive. Did it help boost the incomes of most Canadians? Not according to Statistics Canada. The poor have gotten poorer, the middle class are stuck in neutral, and the rich – the people Prentice was speaking to – have soaked up almost all of the increased wealth in North America over the past 20 years. We need trade corridors and enhanced border security “In New Orleans, the three North American Leaders discussed ways to coordinate our respective investments in border infrastructure to reduce bottlenecks and congestion. We all have an interest in building strong corridors to enhance North American trade… And yet, we face renewed challenges to keep the trade and traffic moving freely while enhancing our surveillance against security threats that are very real.” The example Prentice gives, which was latched onto by the media, is the auto industry’s need to move parts across the border several times before they become a completed vehicle. Border security and delays make just-in-time production a problem. “Not long from now, we will see the first Chinese- or Indian-manufactured vehicles arrive on North American shores, ready to be sold to eager consumers,” he said. “These vehicles will have encountered a border delay only once.” And not long ago, for every car sold in Canada, you had to build one here too. It was a fair deal that benefited both consumers and workers. But it was tossed out the window with NAFTA and then the WTO. Instead of rethinking the wisdom of past policies, the SPP plan is to fortify the current faulty trading model by building a new trucking-only bridge at the Windsor-Detroit crossing. “Prime Minister Stephen Harper is said to be pushing to have the deal finalized by the fall, before U.S. President George W. Bush departs from office in early 2009,” reported CBC of the new $5-billion bridge, “the biggest joint construction effort in the history of Canada-U.S. relations, and the largest public-private partnership in Canadian history.” The tar sands are about North American energy security “Government worked with industry and together we went down many blind alleys,” said Prentice. “Today, the oil sands development drives a significant portion of the Canadian economy, and it is a very important part of a secure energy supply for North America.” The extent to which it doesn’t secure the Canadian energy supply is increasingly ridiculous. Not only do current tar sands projections offer near exclusive access for the U.S. market (pending U.S. legislation that could ban the dirty stuff from U.S. government vehicles), but there are even plans to ship Alberta crude via pipeline to Maine where it would be loaded onto boats and sent to the Gulf region for refining! Obviously the capacity for west-to-east energy supplies is there, and yet Atlantic Canada is a net importer of foreign oil and gas. Oil companies can recycle water and carbon dioxide in the tar sands "The industry has found ways to recycle its water, and reclaim its tailing ponds, and is looking at ways to inject carbon dioxide into geological formations — return the carbon to the ground it came from. It partners with wildlife and conservation groups to preserve habitat… “We've come a long way. Industries have reduced the amount of greenhouse gas they emit, and the amount of water they use per unit of energy,” said Prentice, perhaps in a momentary daydream, as there is little evidence the tar sands will ever be exploited in an environmentally conscious way. In the end, Prentice’s speech was just one of many coming out of Canada these days, complaining of a “thick” or “sticky” border, in the language of Perrin Beatty, president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce. The U.S. government uses its borders like a deregulatory weapon against countries hoping to access its massive consumer market. Consecutive Canadian governments have been operating under the illusion that they should be exempted from this economic reality and have pursued lopsided, paranoid and socially unjustifiable projects like the SPP with the delusional hope that some kind of new, happy equilibrium can be achieved between the security and prosperity with the United States. Critics of the original free trade agreement between Canada and the U.S. at the time pointed out how obvious it was that Canada would end up ceding much of its sovereignty, not only on economic but also security and social issues. As we watch our Industry Minister beg to keep the border open in front of America’s corporate elite, we should consider the major opportunity we now have to rethink this North American trading model. As the Statistics Canada data shows, the NAFTA-SPP model is not benefiting all Canadians equally.
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