until new markets can be found<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n‘Ransom money’<\/h2>\n
Former lumber council executive and trade diplomat Carl Grenier wanted the federal government to step up quickly. In the last softwood lumber dispute, Paul Martin’s Liberal government came to the table in 2005 with too little, too late, he said. The industry was already on its knees and desperate to get\u00a0a deal.<\/p>\n
An earlier package this time\u00a0tells the U.S. “if you want to play the same game again, we will support the industry,\u00a0and so you won’t get to bring us back to the table quickly [and]\u00a0do a quick and dirty deal,” he said.<\/p>\n
It’s also a sign the federal government isn’t terribly confident of a quick resolution to the dispute, whatever optimism\u00a0ministers may cling\u00a0to\u00a0in public. If things were about to be fixed, they wouldn’t need an action plan.<\/p>\n
A long dispute means\u00a0the U.S. collects more duties on Canadian products. In 2006,\u00a0$500 million of the final\u00a0settlement ended up\u00a0in\u00a0the pockets of U.S. lumber producers.<\/p>\n
“The appetite for this ransom money is still there with the [U.S. lumber] coalition,” he said. “Basically the U.S. has learned to game the system.”<\/p>\n
![\"Canada](\"https:\/\/i.cbc.ca\/1.4148488.1496777857!\/cpImage\/httpImage\/image.jpg_gen\/derivatives\/original_620\/canada-softwood-lumber-20170510.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
In addition to loans and loan guarantees for struggling lumber producers, the federal government’s plan includes programs for workers who lose their jobs. (Darren Calabrese\/Canadian Press)<\/p>\n
Softwood lumber as a commodity doesn’t currently fall under the\u00a0NAFTA\u00a0agreement,\u00a0but disputes over softwood lumber duties can be appealed to a NAFTA tribunal.<\/p>\n
Grenier warns against trying to fold softwood lumber into the NAFTA renegotiations. <\/p>\n
“We’ll lose every time,” he said. There’s no pleasing the U.S. lobby.<\/p>\n
On top of that, Canada shouldn’t agree to get into a discussion about the rules for settling\u00a0disputes while one’s underway, he said.<\/p>\n
Eventually, Canada is expected to appeal the latest duties. If it wins under the\u00a0NAFTA\u00a0arbitration process, Canada gets\u00a0its money back.<\/p>\n
Canada won last time, but its\u00a0decision to accept a settlement anyway undermined that victory.<\/p>\n
Now the U.S. wants to renegotiate or even do away with NAFTA’s\u00a0Chapter 19 process.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“This is something Canada should resist at all costs,” Grenier said.<\/p>\n
Canada could still appeal to the World Trade Organization, but it\u00a0doesn’t return the duties paid.<\/p>\n
‘Timing seems off’<\/h2>\n
Canadian and American trade lawyer Mark Warner sees the package\u00a0as an “inviting target” for\u00a0Americans to challenge as an export subsidy.<\/p>\n
Regardless of what the WTO may eventually rule, coming out with this package now\u00a0“seems overly\u00a0aggressive,” he said, if Foreign Affairs Minister\u00a0Chrystia\u00a0Freeland\u00a0wants\u00a0to settle the softwood lumber file before diving into\u00a0NAFTA.<\/p>\n
“The timing seems off to me,” he wrote to CBC News, saying Freeland seems “remarkably tone deaf” about how asymmetrical the trade relationship is between the two countries.\u200e<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
![\"Softwood](\"https:\/\/i.cbc.ca\/1.4148506.1496778358!\/cpImage\/httpImage\/image.jpg_gen\/derivatives\/original_620\/softwood-lumber-carr-20170601.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland is in charge of trade negotiations with the Americans. While some want to resolve the softwood lumber dispute before NAFTA talks begin, it’s looking less and less likely. (Adrian Wyld\/Canadian Press)<\/p>\n
Brett House, the deputy chief economist at Scotiabank,\u00a0thinks the package is thoughtful and doesn’t run\u00a0afoul of the\u00a0rules.<\/p>\n
Helping displaced workers or finding new markets is outside the scope of litigation. As for government-backed\u00a0loans, today’s\u00a0low interest rates\u00a0mean\u00a0any discount is likely too\u00a0small to be\u00a0material, he said.<\/p>\n
The greatest\u00a0value of the loans may be\u00a0who’s eligible: large producers\u00a0named in the U.S. investigation<\/a>\u00a0may not\u00a0need them, but more marginal companies might.\u00a0<\/p>\n“This potentially lowers the playing field a bit internally for smaller producers,” House\u00a0said. “The little guys are employing more people, almost more certainly, because they’re not using technology that’s as labour-saving as the big guys.”<\/p>\n
Turning\u00a0eligibility into a trade complaint would be “perverse,”\u00a0he said. The U.S. caused the problems in the first place.<\/p>\n
The way duties were levied\u00a0\u2014 with some producers paying more than others\u00a0\u2014 is\u00a0the latest U.S. attempt\u00a0to divide Canada’s\u00a0industry.<\/p>\n
More anti-dumping duties are expected June 23.<\/p>\n
“It’s every man for himself,” former lumber council executive Grenier said, with provinces each turning to\u00a0their own advisors.<\/p>\n
“U.S. authorities don’t care a whit about the way the forests are managed,” he said. “They only care about the possibility of kicking Canadian exporters of softwood lumber out of the market when prices are low.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p><\/p>\n
Article source: http:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/news\/politics\/softwood-lumber-package-risks-1.4148007?cmp=rss<\/a>\r\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When the federal government sets out to bolster a sector\u00a0already under fire for getting too much of a boost, it has to tread carefully. Last week, Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr tried to explain how his softwood lumber action plan was an “appropriate response” to U.S. countervailing duties. Right on\u00a0cue, the U.S. lobby driving the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":78792,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[84],"class_list":["post-78788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-political","tag-political"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78788\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usa.timesofnews.com\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}