OTTAWA —
With just one week to go until the current Canada-U.S. border closure agreement expires, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says border discussions with the U.S. are “ongoing,” adding that he expects to have more to say later in the week.
This comes as Trudeau spoke to U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday morning, though the border was not among the range of topics the prime minister said the two world leaders discussed — despite the looming July 21 deadline.
“Every month we have been able to extend the border closures to all but essential goods and services and those discussions are ongoing with the United States right now as we are a week from the next deadline for closures,” Trudeau said.
“We’re going to continue to work hard to keep Canadians safe and to keep our economies flowing, we will have more to say later this week I’m sure.”
Canada has been under renewed pressure to reopen the shared border, despite surging COVID-19 case numbers in the United States. At the end of June, the U.S. became home to the world’s highest number of reported infections: more than 2.2 million. That number has since soared to more than 3.3 million, according to the New York Times, with more than 134,000 deaths.
Despite these figures, 29 bipartisan members of U.S. Congress penned an open letter to Public Safety Minister Bill Blair calling on the Canadian government to plan a phased reopening of the Canada-U.S. border and to consider easing existing measures.
“We are asking that the United States and Canada immediately craft a comprehensive framework for phased reopening of the border based on objective metrics and accounting for the varied circumstances across border regions,” read the letter, which was published on Western New York Congressman Brian Higgins’ website on July 3.
The members of Congress, who represent the northern states along the border, also implored the Canadian government to consider easing restrictions on family members and property owners impeded by the restrictions.
The Canadian government pushed back on the request, with Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland’s office telling CTVNews.ca in a statement that the health and safety of Canadians is “absolutely priority.”
“Decisions about Canada’s border are made by Canadians, for Canadians,” Freeland’s spokesperson Katherine Cuplinskas said in the statement on Friday.
The suggestion was also unpopular with non-politician Canadians, who took to social media to express their staunch opposition.
In response to a tweet from Higgins, who had shared the open letter on his Twitter account, hundreds of Canadians slammed the suggestion.
“No thank you…clean up your backyard before you attempt to enter ours..sincerely Canada,” wrote a user who goes by the name @MichelletypoQ.
Another user, @rachelinTO, wrote that “most of our earliest cases came from the U.S. So……that’s a firm ‘no’. Sorry, eh.”
Users called the request “disastrous” and multiple accounts said they’d only be comfortable easing restrictions after seeing improvement in the number of COVID-19 cases in the U.S.
TRUMP, TRUDEAU DISCUSS TARIFF THREAT
While Trudeau did not give any indication in his press conference that he and Trump had touched on the border issue during their phone call on Monday, he did confirm that the two discussed a host of other issues — including China and the two detained Canadians, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the U.S. president’s renewed aluminium tariff threat.
“I impressed upon him that it would be a shame to see tariffs come in between our two countries at a time where we’re celebrating NAFTA , and at a time where we want our businesses and our manufacturers to get going as quickly as possible,” Trudeau said.
“We pledged to keep working on it together.”
Trudeau also said he told Trump that the pandemic had disrupted the usual supply chains and manufacturing processes, but that this disruption is slowly subsiding.
“That is starting to realign itself, given the economies are starting up again and manufacturing is getting going,” Trudeau said.
CTV News confirmed the possibility of the U.S. slapping another set of tariffs on Canada at the end of June. The tariffs would fall under Section 232 of the U.S. Trade Expansion Act, and the threat comes amid U.S. claims that their aluminum market is being flooded by Canadian product.
Two Canadian sources told CTV News at the time that the announcement is possible in the coming weeks, though to date no formal announcement of tariffs has transpired.
Should the U.S. decide to re-impose tariffs on Canada, it would reopen a trade rift between the two countries that had been healing since a spat just over a year ago, that saw the U.S. impose tariffs on steel and aluminum and Canada answer with tariffs on a wide array of U.S. products including quiche, mayonnaise, and toilet paper.
Trudeau has been outspoken in his defence of Canada’s aluminum industry, noting when the possibility of the U.S. imposing new tariffs emerged recently, that the U.S. “needs Canadian aluminum” and would only be hurting its own economy.
“Our economies are so interlinked that punitive actions by the United States administration end up hurting Americans the same way they end up hurting Canadians,” Trudeau said at the time.
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
