When Parliament reconvenes Oct. 4, the Liberal government will find itself under attack, or at least facing opposition suspicion, over the World Trade Organization framework deal it accepted July 31 to keep world trade talks going.
The framework deal meant to guide WTO talks to their conclusion within a few years commits Canadian negotiators to agree to a deal that lowers domestic farm support, offers greater import access to compete with protected supply managed sectors and puts the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly on the negotiating table.
The payback for trade-dependent sectors in the negotiating framework would be agreements from the world’s heaviest subsidizers to cap and then reduce their levels of support and promises to cut tariff barriers and increase market access.
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Conservative agriculture critic Diane Finley said in an interview it is too early in the WTO process to know if promised trade improvements will materialize.
Already, though, there are danger signals at the talks and the Liberal government appears to be reneging on election campaign promises to protect supply management from harm at the WTO talks.
“The Liberals have been proclaiming that they are going to protect supply management and yet they have just signed an agreement that could mean the end of it,” she said from her Haldimand-Norfolk riding in southern Ontario.
“You can be sure the government will be held accountable for that. We will remind them of their commitments.”
New Democrat agriculture critic Charlie Angus also will have some political bones to pick with the government.
“At the end of the day, U.S. farmers are still able to live on a large cushion of taxpayer subsidies while we are many steps closer to allowing open season on fundamental areas of our domestic economy,” he said in a statement issued by NDP head office in Ottawa.
“The farmers I’ve talked to have made it clear that we have a lot more to lose from this agreement than what we stand to gain. The future viability of our rural regional economy must remain the No. 1 goal in obtaining an international trade deal.”
Finley, a rookie MP who last week completed her first visit to Western Canada since she was appointed opposition agriculture critic, said a WTO deal that calls for negotiation over the future of the CWB monopoly should lead to the end of the monopoly.
“It is our position that participation in the Canadian Wheat Board should be voluntary for western farmers, just as it is for Ontario farmers who get to decide if they want to use the Ontario Wheat Board or not,” she said.
