MEDIA RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 27, 2007

The Council of Canadians warns new Charest-McGuinty pact will undermine local democracy

The Council of Canadians warns that the accord Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty and Quebec Premier Jean Charest have agreed to negotiate will resemble the highly contentious Trade Investment Labour Mobility Agreement (TILMA) signed into law by British Columbia and Alberta last April without public consultation.

“Proponents of these interprovincial deals have not been able to make a compelling case for the need to eliminate so-called trade barriers or even identify them,” says Eduardo Sousa, Council of Canadians regional organizer for Ontario and Quebec. “This is a solution in search of a problem.”

Labour, social justice and environmental groups in Alberta  and BC have strongly criticized TILMA’s dispute resolution mechanism  for undermining local democracy by allowing corporations to sue provincial governments for any provincial or municipal government measure they feel "restricts or impairs" their investment.

“In beginning these talks without any public consultation, McGuinty and Charest have proven that they have learned nothing from the experience in BC and Alberta,” says Stuart Trew, researcher-writer for the Council of Canadians. “They should take the lead of Saskatchewan, which rejected the deal after wide-ranging consultations with academics, experts and citizens.”

BC municipalities are frustrated by the provincial government’s failure to consult them before signing on to TILMA. At the Union of British Columbia Municipalities AGM in September this year, they passed a motion to either drastically alter TILMA, to address the concerns of local governments, to be exempted from TILMA, or to push the province to scrap the agreement entirely.

The Council of Canadians is demanding answers to the following questions:

1. What are the so-called trade barriers that have required McGuinty and Charest to negotiate this deal?
2. What rights will the accord give corporations and will it include a dispute resolution mechanism resembling that of TILMA?
3. What is the timeline for the implementation of this accord between Quebec and Ontario?
4. There has been news of the Ontario Finance Ministry reviewing the possibility of joining the BC-Alberta deal. Will there be public disclosure of the results of this review?

The organization calls on the provincial governments to ensure greater transparency and engage the public in meaningful consultations on this new policy direction.

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For more information, please contact:
Dylan Penner, Media Officer: Tel.: (613) 233-4487, ext. 249; .

Read more about TILMA at canadians.org/TILMA.