Legal review of Canada-EU trade deal complete, likely to come into force in 2017

OTTAWA – The federal government says the legal overview of Canada’s free trade deal with the European Union has been completed – and also the door is open for that pact to come into force next year.

An agreement in principle was reached around the comprehensive deal, known as CETA, in October 2013. Negotiations between Canada and also the 28-member EU began in 2009.

The agreement was negotiated under the former Conservative government, but International Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland said Monday the Liberals supported CETA during opposition.

“This is actually a gold-plated trade deal,” said Freeland, who added that CETA’s entry into force can give Canada access to an industry of 500 million people.

“It will bring tremendous benefit to Canadians and also to Europeans. We are going to feel everything inside a real increase in prosperity and I’m confident this is going to become the landmark trade agreement.”

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In making the announcement, Freeland pointed to modifications including changes that strengthen the best of governments to manage, including in areas such as labour and the environment.

“These days, it’s right and appropriate to make clear in trade agreements the power, and even the democratic responsibility, of governments to regulate,” she said.



Modifications, she added, are also made to allow for a permanent dispute-settlement tribunal and an appeal system.

“The core perception of having a dispute-resolution process is not to supersede that right to regulate – it’s to ensure that governments don’t discriminate against foreign investors,” Freeland said. “That’s the core idea behind trade deals.”

Earlier this month, Canada’s chief negotiator Steve Verhuel told a parliamentary committee that Ottawa was working with the EU to revise controversial investor protection provisions in CETA.

Verhuel said Ottawa was exploring whether improvements might make the dispute-resolution mechanism more favourable to Canada.

The Europeans first raised the matter after political opposition surfaced in Europe in 2014 over the chapter that are responsible for settling disputes between companies and governments, referred to as ISDS.

Some European politicians and anti-trade activists have expressed concerns that the investor-state dispute settlement chapter will give big companies the ability to sue governments for creating regulations affecting their profits.

They have warned it might undermine the ability of countries to manage environmental and health policies, among other things.

European officials, such as the EU ambassador to Canada, have said they didn’t see ISDS as an impediment to the pact’s implementation.

Freeland, who expects to sign the deal later this season, said she didn’t hear any opposition to CETA during consultations she held on it across the nation.

She said there’s still time before next year’s ratification to appear closely in the agreement to determine potential negative effects for some sectors and how Ottawa can respond to them.