CETA - Trust No One - Part Two

As reported in today's Star, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, after meeting with Stephen Harper, has promised to push for early completion of the gruelling negotiations for a Canada-European Union free trade pact.

While that may hearten those who believe the pact would be an unalloyed blessing for Canada's economy, there are many others, including Canadian municipal governments, that are not so sure:

HARPER SAYS: It’s a myth that CETA would prevent Canada’s municipal governments from sourcing goods and services locally.

WE SAY: The procurement rules in CETA will prohibit any covered government or public agency from preferring one bidding firm over another based on the amount of Canadian or local content in the goods or services that firm is offering. Already procurement, or public spending, is open and transparent in Canada. Already European firms bid on and win major construction and other projects. The only thing CETA does is lock municipalities into one way of spending, where the lowest bid wins every time. It means giving up the right to use procurement as a sustainable development or job creation tool.

Wayne Easter, the Liberal Party's critic for International Trade, expresses similar misgivings about CETA in an article for iPolitics.

CETA - Trust No One - Part One

As I get older, I sometimes feel like a character from the X-Files, one of the recurring motifs of which was "Trust No One.'

I think I have lived long enough and read widely enough to know that things purported to be the truth are often the exact opposite. Such is the case, I believe, with the Harper government propaganda surrounding the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement CETA) currently being negotiated.

While much has been written about it, it has a relatively low public profile, and even lower public understanding of its implications, thanks largely, I suspect, to the kind of breathless endorsement of its 'potential' from the MSM, including The Financial Post.

Happily, as always, there are organizations that challenge this rosy depiction, not the least of which is The Council of Canadians.

While the full piece is available at the above link, I am going to post parts of it tonight and tomorrow in the belief that small amounts of information, especially when read online, are more readily digested than large ones:

In April 2012, the Harper government launched a propaganda campaign in response to growing criticism of the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). The campaign material, housed on a new DFAIT webpage , attempts to respond to several claims about CETA which the government believes to be myths. Unfortunately, in answering these claims, the Harper government introduces even more misleading and even false information about the impacts that “next generation” trade agreements like CETA will have in a number of social and public policy areas.

HARPER SAYS: Canada’s free trade agreements exclude health care, public education and other social services maintained for a public purpose.

WE SAY: Public pressure forced the Canadian government to seek better protections for health care in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) but CETA could undermine those protections. As private, for-profit activity increases in health care, education and other social services, it’s not clear a trade or investment panel would agree that these are services “maintained for a public purpose.” As proposed by Scott Sinclair , senior trade expert with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Canada should negotiate a new exemption, modeled on the cultural exemption in Canadian trade deals, which assures that nothing in CETA “shall be construed to apply to measures adopted or maintained by a party with respect to health care, public health insurance, public education and other social services.”

More to come tomorrow.

An Update on Sayed Sharifi

After many setbacks, Sayed Shah Sarifi, the brave young Afghan interpreter who recently arrived in Toronto thanks to his own tenacity and the efforts of people of goodwill, has landed his first Canadian job.

You can read this good-news story here.

We Want To Make It Easy For You To Vote

Or at least some of you. Only in America, eh?

Be Careful Where You Paddle

I guess this is what happens when we forget our place.

A Tale of Two Countries: G.M. in Canada and Colombia

Corporations have, shall we say, a rather checkered history in dealing with the workers who make possible their profits, often viewing them as disposable commodities to be chewed up and then spit out.

As contract talks with the Big Three automakers get underway, CAW president Ken Lewenza has issued this warning:

Canada's 24,000 auto workers deserve to share in the gains the auto makers have made since 2009 when a multi-million dollar government bailout and worker concessions helped keep a struggling industry in business, he said.

“The companies have profited because of our members' sacrifices. They have no economic or ethical right to demand further concessions,” Lewenza told a press conference Tuesday at the Sheraton Hotel in downtown Toronto.

Of course, the big hammer the automakers wield is the threat of relocating their operations to jurisdictions where labour costs are lower, and workers are deemed 'expendable'.

Places like Colombia, where on-the-job-injury results in dismissal.

But the workers there are not going "quietly into that good night."

Nine days into a hunger strike in which he has sewn shut his mouth, Jorge Parra, a former worker for General Motors in Colombia, says his condition is deteriorating. “I have terrible pains in my stomach, my lips are swollen and sore, and I am having problems sleeping,” he says. “But I will not give up.”

The 35-year-old is one of a group of men who say they were fired after suffering severe workplace injuries at GM’s Bogota factory, Colmotores, and have taken drastic action to demand compensation.

After protesting for a year outside the United States embassy with no results, four of the ex-workers sewed shut their mouths on August 1, followed by another three men a week later. More will undergo the procedure every week until their complaints are answered, they say.

Debased

It is the only word that seems remotely appropriate to describe the view of human nature implicit in this article, published in the National Post, dealing with the Pope's butler, Paolo Gabriele, the man who leaked embarrassing documents to the media with the intent of exposing Vatican corruption he hopes public scrutiny will ensure an end to.

In other words, the man acted out of conscience; his integrity wouldn't allow him to continue to be a party to concealment of wrongdoing.

If you read through the article, however, towards the end you might be unsettled to learn that the butler's integrity is seen as fit fodder for psychological examination.

I guess because it truly seems to be a rare phenomenon these days, it is considered a potential abnormality.