The Bill C-300 Walk of Shame

Bill C-300, An Act respecting Corporate Accountability for the Activities of Mining, Oil or Gas in Developing Countries, was the attempt to provide a mechanism for dealing with environmental and human rights violations supported or perpetrated by Canadian companies abroad.

Despite being a Liberal bill, it barely passed second reading in the House on April 22, 2009 by a mere 4 votes, because 20 Libs and 7 Dippers missed the vote.

Yesterday in the House, the Bloc's Richard Nadeau quoted from Not on Our Watch: The Mission to End Genocide in Darfur and Beyond by Don Cheadle and John Prendergast with an introduction written by Barack Obama, published in 2007 :

"The Sudanese regime, supported by Canadian, Malaysian and Chinese oil companies, was able to wipe out whole populations in south-central Sudan, leaving the way clear for the oil companies to start pumping the oil."

and Noir Canada: Pillage, corruption et criminalité en Afrique, 2008

"In Bulyanhulu, Tanzania, bulldozers and the national police force were used to expropriate several hundred small-scale miners and clear the way for Canada's Sutton Mining to exploit the area. Fifty-two people were buried alive in that operation. Sutton Mining was then bought by another Canadian company, Barrick Gold."

The International Trade Committee has been hearing similar testimony and much worse for the last 18 months.

Today Bill C-300 went down to defeat in the House 140 to 134 because the following 13 Liberals, 4 Bloc, and 4 NDP skipped the vote (2 Bloc and 2 Cons were paired). Those with a star beside their name also missed the vote on this bill last time, which might lead one to wonder at the coincidence.

Libs : Michael Ignatieff*, Scott Brison*, Ujjal Dosanjh*, John McCallum*, Geoff Regan*, Scott Andrews, Sukh Dhaliwal, Ruby Dhalla, Martha Hall Findlay, Jim Karygiannis, Gerard Kennedy, Keith Martin, and Anthony Rota.

NDP : Charlie Angus*, Bruce Hyer, Pat Martin, and Glen Thibeault

Bloc : Monique Guay, Francine Lalonde, Carole Lavallée, and Yves Lessard.

A special shout-out to Libs Michael Ignatieff, Scott Brison, and Scott Andrews who were all present in the House today yet somehow failed to vote for Bill C-300.
Bruce Hyer of the NDP was there to vote on the 14 amendments to this bill just prior to the vote but not for the final vote.

Cowards. Shame on you all.
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The Canada-Jordan FTA - a licence for human trafficking

On Monday the International Trade Committee heard devastating evidence from two witnesses warning that the Canada-Jordan Free Trade Act will merely provide cover for human trafficking and primarily benefit only China and large multinationals like Walmart and Kmart.

Tim Waters, Political Director of United Steelworkers :

"The U.S.-Jordan trade deal immediately descended into the trafficking of tens of thousands of foreign workers to Jordanian factories."

Waters said he had been a champion of passing the US-Jordan FTA in the mistaken belief that it would benefit both US and Jordanian workers and level the international playing field on tarriffs. Instead, on visiting Jordan, he found almost no Jordanians working in the factories there; over 90%, some 30,000+ workers, are all imported.

Factory owners from India, Sri Lanka, and China imprison 'guest' workers from Bangladesh, China, India, Nepal, and the Philippines in compounds in Jordan where they are worked from 12 to 18 hours a day seven days a week in appalling conditions under constant threat of rape, beatings, and deportation.

Locked up after having their passports confiscated at the airport, these indentured labourers have no recourse to the law - despite Lib Scott Brison, FTA pointman for the Cons once again, echoed by Lib Martha Hall Findlay once again, laughably touting the FTA in the House as ensuring :

"following the precedent set by the U.S.-Jordan FTA ... the right to freedom of association, the right to collective bargaining, the abolition of child labour, the elimination of forced or compulsory labour, and the elimination of discrimination."

Moreover, said Waters, although human rights provisions embedded in the core of the US bill were ignored in Jordan despite the US wielding the big stick of foreign aid, the similar but weaker Canadian safeguards stand to be even less enforceable as they are only part of a side agreement to Bill C-8.

Gosh, another dubious LibroCon labour rights side agreement - just like Brison's previous precious - the Canada-Colombia FTA.

Waters begged the committee members not to make the same mistake in trusting foreign corporations based in Jordan to police their own human and labour rights standards, a decision his union "deeply regrets". It simply does not work, he said.

Charles Kernaghan, U.S. National Labor Committee executive director :

"When the workers signed their three-year contract to go to Jordan, they were told they'd get free food, free health care, free housing --all of it decent. That is not true.

We've seen that with a Canadian apparel company, the Nygard company. It was producing at a factory called International British Garments. In April, when we investigated that factory, 1,200 workers had been stripped of their passports. They were working from 7 in the morning until 11 at night: 16 hours a day, 7 days a week. For the 110 hours of time they were at the factory, they were paid less than half of the minimum wage. They faced sexual harassment, filthy dormitories, and bedbugs."

On top of all that they are charged for their food and have no access to medical attention.

The response to this testimony was about what we've come to expect from this committee.
Liberal MP and moral idiot John Cannis :

"What you're saying is that it's okay if the rest of the world goes and puts on paper firm guidelines and agrees to the wording, and it's firm and it's strong and so on, and says, “Canada, you continue being the boy scout, and we'll continue doing business”.

Waters :

"With all due respect, I don't think that argument holds, simply because you can't say that since everybody else is wrong and everybody else is doing it, then we should too. Had we [United Steelworkers] known what was going to happen, we never would have supported this, okay? We supported it only because we took the deal at face value."

He went on to say that aside from the garment-producing multinationals, the other beneficiary of slave labour in Jordan is China - where the fabric is imported from.

"The U.S.-Jordan free trade agreement actually benefited China more than anyone else: we estimate about $100 million a year in tariff breaks for their textiles to enter the United States. ... By contrast, benefits to US workers were negligible."

Con Gerald Keddy pretends to miss the point that the US-Jordan FTA labour regs are being entirely ignored along with Jordan's own labour laws, and goes with the "mistakes were made" defence :

"You can't come to us and tell us we have to change the rules. Under our agreement on labour cooperation, we have put some very strict guidelines in this agreement. This does not apply simply to Jordanian workers; it also applies to migrant workers and migrant labour. It is under the International Labour Organization's international guidelines and, quite frankly, it recognizes that some of the migrant worker regulatory regime in Jordan has been less than perfect, that there have been some abuses and some mistakes made ...

In our agreement we also have the ability to facilitate the dissemination of information--specifically labour information--to guest workers and migrant workers so that they actually do understand their rights."

Yeah, Keddy, that's the ticket. A pamphlet drop.

Kernaghan responds to Keddy :

"We asked the Jordanian government to allow NGOs in from the countries where the workers are from, from Bangladesh and from Sri Lanka--and that would be the single biggest element--so that the workers would have advocates. They flat out refused."

Con Ed Holder waxes interminably about all the wonderful benefits that will accrue for Canada, despite total trade in merchandise between Canada and Jordan standing at a measly $82 million.

Waters:

"The benefit was for the garment producers in Jordan to have duty-free access into the U.S. market. 86% of the exports from Jordan to the United States are garments. They're at the table here because they want the same duty-free access to the Canadian marketplace that they have to the U.S. marketplace."

Bill C-8, the Canada-Jordan FTA, passed second reading in the House on Sept 27 and is well on its way to being blessed into law by the ConservaLiberal coalition. The International Trade Committee consists of 6 Cons, 3 Libs, 2 Bloc, and 1 NDP, with all 3 Libs having pledged to support it.

Irony Alert : Yesterday Public Safety Minister Vic Toews and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney announced proposed legislation to crack down on human trafficking in Canada.

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Rights and Democracy - remember them? - and the Canada-Colombia FTA

The Canada-Colombia-how-much-for-the-little-girl?-Free Trade Investment Agreement, or Bill C2, will pass third reading later today just as Martha Hall Findlay begins to get the feeling back in her lower jaw.

Last fall the parliamentary Trade Committee recommendations on C-2, then known as C-23, included one for an independent human rights assessment before the deal passed. Last fall this recommendation was considered integral to passing the agreement. This year the Libs don't much care for it, having jettisoned it in favour of Lib Scott Brison's preference for hearing about human rights abuses after they occur.

From 2007 through 2009, one of the recommendations read :

"that an independent, impartial, and comprehensive human rights impact assessment should be carried out by a competent body, which is subject to levels of independent scrutiny and validation; the recommendations of this assessment should be addressed before Canada considers signing, ratifying and implementing an agreement with Colombia."

And who was to do this human rights assessment?

"The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada draw on the work of the organization Rights and Democracy to give an independent body the mandate to conduct studies regarding the impact on rights and the environment when it is negotiating economic agreements with countries at risk, as in the case of the agreement with Colombia."

And look what happened to them.
They got a new chairman, a new president, four new board members, and a new mandate at the bottom of Steve's sock drawer.

What sort of work might R&D have recommended on a potential trade agreement with Colombia if they hadn't been gutted?

R&D Feb. 1, 2007 :

"Colombian paramilitary leader Salvatore Mancuso’s recent admission that he facilitated the disappearance and killing of celebrated indigenous leader Kimy Pernia Domico, winner of Rights & Democracy’s 2003 John Humphrey Freedom Award, raises new concerns that justice for victims of human rights abuses will not be served by Colombia’s current demobilization process.

R&D goes on to note that Kimy Pernia Domico had come to Canada years before to give testimony to Members of Parliament about :

"the devastating effects of an internationally-funded hydroelectric dam on the Embera-Katio’s traditional lands and livelihoods, a project which received $18.2-million in funding from Export Development Canada."

Say, how did that work out?

Land and Life, a 2007 doc film from Kathy Price, former CBC foreign affairs producer :

"examines the devastating impact of a hydroelectric project on the Embera Katío Indigenous people and raises disturbing questions about a Canadian crown corporation that provided financing."

Was the gutting of Rights and Democracy only about protecting Israel from criticism?
Maybe not. Maybe it wasn't supposed to blow up like that. Maybe, as they could not have forseen the death of Remy Beauregard, staff were not expected to rebel.
Maybe Steve thought the addition of a few new board members was all that was needed to get R&D to write him up some really enthusiastic reports on Colombia's remarkable progress in reducing poverty by 1% per year while simultaneusly increasing the gap between rich and poor for the benefit of whichever oil or mining project we are funding there this week.

That appears to be Scott Brison's job now.
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On coalitions, mergers and aquisitions

Liberal MP Martha Hall Findlay stood three separate times in the House on Friday to beg the Cons for recognition of the "important work" the Liberal Party had done to ensure the expected passage of the Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement at third reading today.

MHF to TradeMin Peter Van Loan :

Mr. Speaker, could the minister speak to the participation of Liberal Party, in particular of my colleague from Kings—Hants, [Scott Brison] that resulted in an addition to this free trade agreement with respect to human rights, of which Liberals are very proud? I believe it was singularly important in being able to get our support for it.
Could the minister speak to Liberals' very constructive participation in the process?

Well we didn't really need your unnecessary figleaf of a human rights amendment that allows Colombia to do its own year-end reports on its human rights atrocities, Peter Van Loan did not quite answer, but then Van Loan's Parliamentary Secretary Con MP Gerald Keddy graciously acceded to her request that the Libs be given credit for it :

I would say that I appreciated the intervention by [LibCon Scott Brison] ... We were, quite frankly, stymied at committee. We were not moving forward. It enabled us to move forward.

Martha Hall Findlay pressed ahead for more pats:

I will point out that earlier, the minister had said that the addition in terms of human rights was not necessary. I am glad to hear my colleague now acknowledging that in order to move this through and to get approval, in fact, the work by my colleague from Kings—Hants [Brison] and the Liberal Party was instrumental in getting this to the point of getting it through the House, so I thank my colleague for that.

Bloc MP Jean-Yves Laforest :

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the hon. Liberal member a question. How can she explain such a drastic change in the Liberal Party's position since last fall, both in committee and in the House, regarding possible support for a free trade agreement with Colombia?
This support was very clearly expressed at the Standing Committee on International Trade. Unanimous consent was reached regarding the need for an independent study—before Canada ratifies the agreement—on the Colombian government's respect for human rights and what it is doing to prevent human rights abuses. Why such a difference between the Liberals' position last fall and their current position?

Martha Hall Findlay now moves into full on Brison fluffer position :

In the end, we determined that it was better to adopt this position for Canada and for people elsewhere.
I would also like to say that the speeches given by my hon. colleague from Kings—Hants [Brison] on human rights greatly helped convince other Liberals that, as a party, we can now support that position.

Brison's speeches! LOFL.
NDP MP Peter Julian points out the very long list of Canadian and Colombian unions and aboriginal and African-Colombians that

"the Liberal Party systematically obstructed and refused to hear from. It shut off all debate before the committee. Two years ago, when we went down to Colombia, the trade committee came back with a unanimous recommendation to not proceed with this agreement."

Martha Hall Findlay says some more things about "the hard work and the excellent work" of Scott Brison and at least the Libs are trying to get along with the Cons, you know? Windows not doors, going forward and all that.

After QP, Transport Minister John Baird had one thing to say in response as debate on Canada-Colombia FTA resumed :

"Unanimous consent to resolve that Jack Layton is the leader of the official opposition, agreed."

Ouch.
I know - not quite the coalition/merger post you were expecting.
But it's the only one that's going on, as the Cons continue to ride the Libs for it.
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Tuesday Update : Libs and Cons - 188 votes ... NDP and Bloc - 79

Scant news coverage today of what amounts to Canadian complicity in a death sentence for trade unionists, small farmers, aboriginals, Afro-Colombians, and the 4 million displaced inside Colombia. In 2009, half the assassinations of trade unionists world wide - 48 out of 100 - took place in Colombia.

Oh wait. Canadian Business Online has something :
House of Commons passes controversial Colombia FTA :

A Human Rights Watch report last year on a massacre in Colombia, and an Amnesty International report, concluded that things have gotten worse in Colombia.

In December 2008, the United Nations high commissioner for human rights criticized the Colombian government for its public stance against human rights advocates on its own soil. The stigmatization of such groups puts their ``life, security and valuable work at risk,'' it said.

Thank you for that, Canadian Business.
I am past disgusted with the fools and knaves and opportunists who represent Canada today.
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Inside the International Trade Committee

Debate on the Canada-Colombia FTA resumed at the International Trade Committee today with the Chair stating he wasn't going to allow a whole lot of witnesses to testify just so they could put it on their resume. Very classy, Mr. Chair.

Today's first witness today was Yessika Hoyos Morales, lawyer, Colombian human rights activist, and the daughter of a murdered trade unionist.

Paramilitaries are still in place in 293 Colombian municipalities, she said, and the Office of the Public Prosecutor, as of Sept 2009, has been carrying out investigations into 2,077 executions of people killed by the national army.

While the government has announced an effort to protect trade unionists and human rights people, the Department of Administrative Security scandal has put paid to that. DAS infiltrated human rights groups and then passed lists on to paramilitary groups to target their members, including judges, with intimidation and murder. Ironically, DAS is now promising to work with these same human rights groups to produce human rights reports for Colombia as part of Canada's FTA conditions.


Gauri Sreenivasan, Canadian Council for International Co-operation, was next up. CCIC believes in the potential of trade agreements to lift people out of poverty, she said, but not this agreement. Why, she asked, is the violence in Colombia always spoken of in terms of fights between rival drug gangs with no mention made of the DAS scandal overseen by Uribe's chosen successor? Or the policy of false positives, the army's extrajudicial killing of civilians who are later dressed up as guerrillas to increase the battle body count which secures more US aid for fighting guerrillas and traffickers.

4.9 million people are displaced in Colombia, second only to Sudan. Violence and displacement are directly linked to the struggle for control over land for the development of resources including the oil, minerals, and gas that Canadian companies are heavily involved in. The UN Raconteur For Internally Displaced People has said the taking over of lands is now a policy of displacement. Who accesses those lands for profit?

The deal is a fairly typical aggressive market access agreement. The safeguards and side deals are quite ineffective. New powers of enforcement to secure access to resources that would discourage future environmental and human rights laws. The Colombian government could not introduce laws to deal with illegal seizure of land after Canadian corps in place. There is no obligation on the part of corporations to screen their security forces and no provision for victims of corporate violations to have access to Canadian courts for violations created by Canadian corps.

Agriculture market access. A very aggressive liberalization of Colombian markets would accelerate displacement. Lifting tariffs on grains, wheat, and pork will undermine 12.000 local wheat farmers and 9000 jobs in informal pork sector. This FTA eliminates measures to protect farmers.

Side note : For an amusing counterpoint to her argument on tariffs, see Con committee member Brad Trost's argument in today's National Post on why this FTA will be good for Colombians :

"Free trade in agriculture will also allow the poor and other consumers to purchase foodstuffs at lower prices because tariffs on Canadian wheat, barley, lentils, peas and other crops will disappear."

This FTA does not even met Nafta standards, Sreenivasan continued. There's no independent means of enforcement and the whole mechanism of the side accord relies exclusively on the goodwill of the governments to enforce the accord. With fines only.

What happened to the proposed independent human rights assessment before implementation?
Canada's seal of approval only serves to pave the way for a US-Colombia deal, currently stalled over human rights complaints.


After all that, it was hard to imagine what former Con now Liberal Scott Brison would counter with. This deal is pretty much his baby in committee now, ever since he forged the Liberal figleaf amendment that would see each country produce ongoing yearly human rights reports instead of a preceding independent one, killed off by the Con in the House in 2008.
Take it away, Scott! :

"It's the most robust FTA agreement ever signed between any two countries.
There's only one party in Colombia against FTAs and it's polling at 5%. Isn't it culturally condescending and sanctimonious for us in Canada to say Colombians don't have the right to self-governance? They are an independent country."

Wow. Scott also asked witness Yessika Morales, daughter of a murdered trade unionist, if things haven't improved and if she didn't feel safer now.
Who is holding the "stupid" gun to Scott Brison's head?
Stewart in Colombia : Liberals Misinforming Public to Promote a FTA with Colombia.
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Friday night Canada-Colombia FTA news dump

(Monday night update below)

On Thursday, the US Dept. of Defense issued a presser from Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates praising Colombia as an "exporter of security" and "a model for the region" in its "crackdown against a leftist insurgency".

Touting the U.S.-Colombian Defense Cooperation Agreement under which the US operates seven of Colombia's military bases, Gates called for a renewal of efforts to pass a US-Colombia free trade agreement, "noting that he talked with National Security Advisor James L. Jones Jr. before his trip here about renewing that effort".

Because, as I posted over at The Galloping Beaver on Thursday night, any discussion of a free trade investment agreement naturally originates with the Defense Dept and the National Security Advisor, so we can take Gates' call for renewed strategic meddling in South America as Canada's midwifing marching orders.

And voilà ... right on schedule ...
On Friday afternoon, as not noted in any of our national media, Con House Leader Jay Hill moved to curtail any further debate of Bill C-2, the Canada-Colombia FTA, before it passes second reading and goes back to committee where a combined LibCon effort will likely pass it .

Lib Ralph Goodale noted the motion was "a bit of a surprise on a Friday afternoon" - indeed it was not mentioned in the daily Order Papers - and Lib Dennis Lee fretted about process, but other than that, no Liberals spoke against it, leaving the Bloc and NDP to point out for the umpteenth time what a completely crap bill it is. Unsurprisingly, Hill's motion passed and Peter Van Loan advised the last day for debate on C-2 will be today.

In Sept 2009 Scott Brison said in the House :

"If we isolate Colombia in the Andean region and leave Colombia exposed and vulnerable to the ideological attacks of Chavez's Venezuela, we will be allowing evil to flourish."

Last month in an effort to stave off criticism for supporting a free trade investment agreement with the country with the worst human rights record in the hemisphere, Brison brokered a deal with Colombian President Uribe at Davos wherein Canada and Colombia will each conduct their own annual human rights assessments, handily circumventing the recommendation by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on International Trade that an independent human rights impact assessment must be done before the agreement is considered.
Yes, their own human rights assessments; their own environmental assessments too.

I don't have a *lol* loud enough for the concept of Uribe and Co. being forced to do their own assessments - something Uribe does yearly already - but the Cons lapped it up, the Libs are happy to have been provided with a fig leaf, and the media are congratulating them both for "making parliament work".

"Making parliament work" apparently means the Cons killing debate on a crap bill after they get a sufficient number of the Libs onside.

Write those Libs before today's vote !

Dear Honourable Members:

In February 2008 Colombian MP Daniel García-Peña appeared before you to explain that the agreement as written would be "very negative for Canada and Colombia."

"Canadian companies would be attracted to Colombia for all the wrong reasons, namely to take advantage of the country's weak labour, human rights and environmental laws.
Many companies will come to bypass the laws Canada has and take advantage of Colombian standards, which are much lower. In many ways [this could] promote the exploitation of workers."

Furthermore, Mr. García-Peña said, a trade deal could destroy the livelihoods of many small Colombian farmers by flooding the market with subsidized agricultural imports.
"The small peasant farmer would be unable to compete with the cheap imports of food," he said. "[This] would wipe them out."

Those who would benefit are the large agro-businesses in Colombia that would buy up the land of destitute farmers for the production of biodiesel, palm oil and beef for export.
Worst of all, Mr. García-Peña added, these large agro-businesses have ties to the paramilitary squads at the heart of the ongoing rights abuses and violence in the South American country.

According to the Washington Post, the millions of dollars in US aid funnelled into Colombia go to the wealthy landowners to grow oil-producing palm groves : "four families received most of the $10 million provided in 2007 and 2008".

45 trade union leaders were killed last year in addition to thousands of indigenous people pushed off their land for mining interests.

And for what?
According to Glen Hodgson, VP and chief economist of the Conference Board of Canada :
"Our annual trade with Colombia is about the same level as that with South Dakota and is actually smaller than that with Delaware or Rhode Island. Compared to other markets much closer, Colombia is not really a major player. 80% of Colombia’s imports to Canada are actually duty free already."

I urge you to vote against the investors rights bill C-2 today.

Thank you.

Monday night update. Canada-Colombia FTA passes 183 to 78
37 Libs voted with the Cons in favour; Bloc and NDP against.
Turns out the media pundits were right about Libs and Cons working happily together to secure agribiz dumping and investment rights for Canadian companies to exploit Colombia.

In the House today, Liberals Bob Rae, Scott Simms, Scott Brison, Martha Hall Findlay, Paul Szabo, Justin Trudeau, and Robert Oliphant joined the Cons in praising Uribe's remarkable progress in reducing poverty by 1% per year while simultaneusly increasing the gap between rich and poor. "We'll be helping!" said the lovely Hall Findlay. "Windows, not walls!"

No Libs voted against the bill, although some abstained. However the debate did gave Lib Scott Brison the opportunity to bring up Hugo Chavez a few more times so that he and Con MP Ed Fast, the Chair of the Justice and Human Rights Committee, could grill NDP's Olivia Chow on why she had never publicly denounced Chavez. I think I liked Brison better when he was a Con.

The bill now heads off to committee for rubberstamping by the 7 out of 12 committee members who already voted in favour of it today.

Walk of Shame - Liberals who voted with the Cons on C-2, the Canada Colombia FTA : Ignatieff, Dion, Rae, Bagnell, Brison, Bagnell, Belanger, Crombie, Cuzner, Dryden, Kirsty Duncan, Easter, Eyking, Fry, Garneau, Goodale, Holland, Hall Findlay, LeBlanc, MacAuley, McCallum, McGuinty, John McKay, Mendes, Shawn Murphy, Murray, Oliphant, Proulx, Ratansi, Regan, Rota, Russell, and Trudeau.
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Libs and Cons - fighting evil together

The June 2008 Committee on International Trade passed a motion that the Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement should not be ratified until an independent human rights impact assessment could be carried out first.
Luckily, former Con MP Scott Brison, now the Liberal trade critic, has found a way around that.
In a deal he hammered out with Colombian President Uribe at Davros in January, Canada and Colombia will each do their own yearly human rights assessments instead.

What's not to like? say the Libs.

Sure, our annual trade with Colombia is smaller than that with Rhode Island and 80% of Colombia’s imports to Canada are duty free already, but let's not forget what's really at stake here :

Scott Brison, in the House on Monday, Sept 14, 2009 :

"If we isolate Colombia in the Andean region and leave Colombia exposed and vulnerable to the ideological attacks of Chavez's Venezuela, we will be allowing evil to flourish."

In a happy coincidence for the Libs and Cons, fighting evil in Colombia includes the handy bonus of providing cover for Canadian corporations to promote exploitation in a country that killed 45 trade unionists in 2009. and will be used to ease passage of the US-Colombia FTA, currently held up in Congress due to concerns about unchecked and increasing human rights abuses.

Saturday morning media-bash update : I see CBC's The House, the G&M, CP, etc are all touting the deal this morning as cats and dogs getting along nicely hey ho parliament does work after all let's see more of this etc. etc.
No, this is just a bipartisan attempt to get around the Trade Committee's motion to have an independent human rights assessment as a precondition to passing the bill. No one has ever doubted that the Canadian and Colombian governments could come up with their own human rights report cards to justify this deal after the fact.
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Libs support Colombian free trade deal

In the House on Monday, Liberal trade critic Scott Brison defended Bill C-23, the Canada Colombia free trade agreement thusly:

"If we isolate Colombia in the Andean region and leave Colombia exposed and vulnerable to the ideological attacks of Chavez's Venezuela, we will be allowing evil to flourish."

Oooh - two Bush cat's paw points for you. Chavez appeared to be much on Brison's mind yesterday and figured several times in his answers, perhaps because the U.S. military has obtained a 10-year lease at seven Colombian bases to help fight drug traffickers and leftists.

He also said the Colombia FTA will provide jobs that will help to turn Colombia away from being a narco-state.
Nice try, Scott. Farming accounts for 22% of employment in Colombia.
The trade agreement eliminates duties on importing Canadian wheat, peas, lentils and barley.
After those farmers go broke trying to compete with Canadian agribiz wheat but before the paramilitaries drive them off their land for the Canadian mining companies, exactly what crop do you think they will be forced to turn to?

The agreement's Chapter 11 style investor's rights allows Canadian mining companies to sue the Colombian government should it ever implement labour or environmental legislation that affects their profits.

MP Claude Guimond, Bloc :

"When asked to adopt mandatory social responsibility standards for Canadian mining companies abroad, the government decided to adopt voluntary standards instead. When asked to create an independent ombudsman who could conduct impartial investigations to validate complaints, the government created the Office of the Extractive Sector Corporate Social Responsibility Counsellor, who reports directly to the minister and investigates only if authorized by the mining company."

Well, what could possibly go wrong with that?

Gerald Keddy, Con Secretary to the Minister of International Trade, amusingly referred to this yesterday as "providing leadership internationally in encouraging free trade and open markets and discouraging protectionism."

Stockwell Day, who has started slipping the phrase "pathways to prosperity" into his remarks, tried to rustle up some good news on the lamentable increase in kidnappings, disappearances, and farmers and their families being driven off their land this last year :

"Kidnappings. Do they still happen? Yes, they do. They still happen in Canada, too. Are people still being murdered in that country? Yes, they are. They are still being murdered in Canada also. More than 350,000 internally displaced persons [in Colombia] have now received comprehensive protection and access to basic social services."

Yes, in addition to the worst human rights record in the hemisphere, Colombia has an internal refugee problem second only to Sudan's.

Chris Charlton, NDP labour critic :

"The shocking reality is that, in the event of the murder of a trade unionist in Colombia, labour protection simply means that the Colombian government would have to pay money into a development fund. Kill a trade unionist, pay a fine. Over 2,200 labour activists have been murdered since 1991.
The penalty for killing a trade unionist was capped at $15 million in any one year, paid by the Colombian government into a development fund. To put this into perspective, one year's maximum payment of $15 million equates to $5,628 per trade unionist already killed."

and then she said something I didn't know :

"Only 0.15% of Canadian exports actually go to Colombia"

and quotes Glen Hodgson, VP and chief economist of the Conference Board of Canada :

"Our annual trade with Colombia is about the same level as that with South Dakota and is actually smaller than that with Delaware or Rhode Island. Compared to other markets much closer, Colombia is not really a major player. Eighty per cent of Colombia’s imports to Canada are actually duty free already."

This agreement isn't about free trade though, remember, it's about protecting investor's rights.

Diane Bourgeois, Bloc :

"Colombian investment in Canada amounts to $1 million, while Canadian investment in Colombia totals roughly $1.058 billion, which can essentially be attributed to the extractive industry....
Twice during the time I was a member of the Subcommittee on Human Rights and International Development, Canadian companies received funding through CIDA.
They used money distributed through CIDA to get paramilitary staff on the company payroll. That money was used to pay hired guns, not to help the people.
At one point, CIDA disbursed $14,000. That is not a lot of money here, but in Colombia, it might be worth $100,000. TVI used that $14,000 to pay professional soldiers to protect company assets and prevent people from using the only remaining source of drinking water because it had contaminated every other source around the site."

Lee Richardson, Con, responds by telling us that "Canada is a world leader" in "promoting best practices in environmental stewardship" :

"As a member from Alberta, I can say that this is especially true in the resource sector when it comes to environmental stewardship and environmental impact assessments. We can offer a lot to our Colombian partners in terms of expertise and best practices. Indeed, Canadian companies are leaders in corporate social responsibility in minimizing the impact of their activities on the environment."

By now you must think I'm making this up or quoting out of context but sadly, you'd be wrong.

Linda Duncan, NDP, speaking to the 'side agreements' on environmental and labour protections :

"The side agreement is basically non-existent. It is simply paper. There is nothing to it. There are vague references to corporate social responsibility. There is absolutely no recourse. There are no penalties in the side agreement of the Colombia-Canada agreement. I do not think it appropriate that the Government of Canada pass over that responsibility simply to a Canadian investor. Were I a Canadian investor I would not want to have to be fulfilling that complete role."

Paul Szabo was the only Lib to recommend that there might be something wrong here and perhaps the bill ought to go back to committee.
Aside from two pleas for further reassurances, the rest of them kept quiet. I'd like to think they were ashamed.
Bob Rae has said : "The Liberal Party will be supportive of the bill proceeding to committee,"

Nothing from former human rights activist Michael Ignatieff.
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Update : And it's shuffled back down in the deck again - for now.
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