Auto workers and manufacturers are rejecting assertions by Canada’s trade minister that the country won major access for them into the highly protected Japanese market in the recently rebooted Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Auto workers and manufacturers are rejecting assertions by Canada’s trade minister that the country won major access for them into the highly protected Japanese market in the recently rebooted Trans-Pacific Partnership.
International Trade Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne told the Senate trade committee last week that Canada won its greatest market access ever into the Japanese market when it signed on last month to the new 11-country version of the Pacific Rim pact that was salvaged after the Trump administration pulled the U. S. out last year.
COMMENTARY: TPP deal a win for Trudeau and a win for Canada
Champagne said the agreement between Canada and Japan is contained in a side-letter, not in the text of the agreement, which he told senators is nonetheless “enforceable.”
WATCH: Canada agrees to revamped TPP deal without U. S.
That’s not possible, say representatives from the auto workers union and two trade associations representing Canadian automobile manufacturers.
They said side agreements are not enforceable unless they are part of an actual trade agreement.
And they reiterated past concerns that Canada’s decision to join the new TPP, without the U. S., would ultimately cost Canadian manufacturing jobs and undermine the country’s interests in wrestling with the U. S. over automobile roadblocks in the ongoing renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement.
The text of the new TPP has not been released and Champagne’s office says the side letter with Japan isn’t ready to be released yet but will be.
Champagne pledged to release the letter during his upbeat Senate testimony on Wednesday in which he heralded the deal with Japan on autos as a breakthrough.
