THE WEST BLOCK
Episode 19, Season 7
Sunday, January 14, 2018
Host: Vassy Kapelos
Guest Interviews: Minister Chrystia Freeland, Marius Grinius, Bonnie Jenkins,
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson
Location: Ottawa
On this Sunday, hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. That’s how Canada’s foreign affairs minister is describing the current state of NAFTA negotiations with the U.S. What is Chrystia Freeland’s Plan B if President Trump pulls out of the deal? We’ll ask.
Then, Canada is set to co-host an international summit in Vancouver this week on the North Korean crisis. What diplomatic options are on the table to deescalate the growing threat?
Plus, a conversation with outgoing Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: What she really thinks about Trudeau’s Bahamas vacation, and what advice she has for her successor.
It’s Sunday, January 14th. I’m Vassy Kapelos, and this is The West Block.
Will he or won’t he pull out of NAFTA? That is the question everyone is asking as Canada prepares for another round of NAFTA negotiations in Montreal, later this month. How worrisome is the unpredictability and what does it mean for you? In a moment we’ll ask Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland. But first, here’s your West Block primer.
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Minister Chrystia Freeland: “We’ll hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.”
Vassy Kapelos: The “worst” in this case is no NAFTA. If Donald Trump pulls out of the deal, what does it mean for Canadians? Foreign trade amounts to just over half our country’s GDP. Three-quarters of Canada’s exports go to the U.S. Manufacturing and auto making are a huge part of that. And jobs could be at risk. About one of every 10 Canadians is directly employed by a manufacturer.
Then, there’s your investments, even just the speculation last week Trump was going to withdraw from NAFTA erased $2 billion from General Motors stock value in less than 90 minutes.
And joining me now from London, Ontario is Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland. Minister Freeland it’s great to have you back on the show, I appreciate it. Last week, Reuter’s reported that Canada was expecting President Trump to pull out of NAFTA imminently. Was that story correct?
Minister Chrystia Freeland: You know what I can tell you, Vassy, is we take President Trump and the U.S. administration at their word and we’ve heard repeatedly, and these have been some very public statements from the U.S. that the U.S. is considering invoking Article 2205, which would be the six-month notice for withdrawal from NAFTA. And so, I think it’s our responsibility as a government to take those statements very seriously and to be prepared for every eventually, which we are. Having said that, my approach is to hope for the best and prepare for the worst. We’re now preparing for the Montreal round of NAFTA negotiations that will be at the end of this month. And I think that provided there is goodwill from all parties, we could make some real meaningful progress in Montreal, and that is what I’m working towards and hoping for.
Vassy Kapelos: And I’ll ask you about those negotiations in a second, but I just want to be clear because that report caused a ripple effect in the stock market. Were you expecting earlier this week that there would be some kind of imminent withdrawal from NAFTA?
Minister Chrystia Freeland: I’ve already explained, Vassy, what our expectations are and I guess another way of putting it might be to say we expect the unexpected. We have heard, and this is very public information because the statements have been made publicly, we’ve heard repeatedly from the U.S. administration that the administration is considering invoking Article 2205, which would give the U.S. a right after six months to withdraw from NAFTA. And so it’s only prudent and appropriate for us to be absolutely prepared for that. Having said that, we also really believe in approaching the negotiations and negotiating table with positive intent, we are working as hard as possible for a positive outcome. And we have now our next round of the negotiations will be in Montreal. We think there are opportunities provided there is goodwill on all sides to make some good progress in Montreal. And having said all of that, while we really believe NAFTA can be modernized, we think NAFTA already is a great deal for Canadians and Americans.
Vassy Kapelos: Was putting that information out there this week a negotiating tactic because now we’ve learned from President that—or at least it sounds like he’ll wait until after the Mexican election.
Minister Chrystia Freeland: I think that that is a really constructive position. Canada’s view about these negotiations has always been that while we are prepared to work as hard, if not harder than any of the other parties, we do our homework, we come to the table ready to go. We really appreciate that trade deals and trade negotiations take a lot of time and that’s particularly the case with the modernization of an agreement like NAFTA. Canadians might not appreciate the NAFTA free trade area is the biggest trading block in the world, and making changes to it is something that has to be done really carefully and with real attention to detail. So I think that taking the time that it takes to have a good deal really makes a lot of sense and I was glad to hear the president saying that this week.
Vassy Kapelos: But just to re-ask the first part of my question because I don’t think you answered it. Were those stories a negotiating tactic?
Minister Chrystia Freeland: Again, Vassy, as I’ve said, I’m very clear in all the public comments I make and what I’ve said from day one is that we are always prepared for everything. And in this particular negotiation, one of our counterparties, the U.S., has been very public about the fact that it is considering the possibility of invoking Article 2205, which would give the U.S. the right after six months to withdraw from NAFTA. And so we are very prepared for that at any moment, as I think Canadians expect us to be. We’re ready for all eventualities. But again, I also want to emphasize that we hope for the best, even as we prepare for the worst. And I think that there are a lot of good reasons to believe, again, provided there is goodwill from all parties provided everyone comes to Montreal with a cooperative mindset, for us to make some meaningful progress.
Vassy Kapelos: When you say that your government is preparing for the worst, does that mean no NAFTA?
Minister Chrystia Freeland: Well certainly, I think we need to look at all the options stage by stage. And I think the first step would be invoking Article 2205, which would be the six month notice of withdrawal, but that is a step before withdrawal. For the U.S. or any country to actually withdraw you would then need to exercise that right after the six month period. And I think there is a lot of uncertainty about what would happen in that six month period. Again, to give Canadians a sense of things, this would be the first time that the U.S. has actually withdrawn from a free trade agreement, so there is a lot of uncertainty about what would actually happen.
Vassy Kapelos: Okay. Thank you very much, Minister. I appreciate your time.
Up next, Canada, will co-host a summit on the North Korean crisis this week. What’s at stake?
Vassy Kapelos: Welcome back. We just heard from Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland, who on Tuesday, will co-host a ministerial meeting with the United States to try and find a diplomatic solution to the North Korean crisis. But China and Russia will not be there, which raises questions about just how much can be accomplished without these two critical players.
Joining me now to discuss the summits prospects are Marius Grinius, Canada’s former ambassador to North and South Korea and in Washington, Bonnie Jenkins, who worked in the state department under the Obama administration.
Ms. Jenkins, I’m going to start with you. In the report that you wrote for Brookings you said China and Russia should be involved. Does the fact that those two countries are not attending this summit diminish the significance of the meetings?
Bonnie Jenkins: Well I think it’s important of course to always be discussing issues regarding North Korea’s nuclear program with China and Russia because they have been part of the past six-party talks and clearly have our interests in the issue. However, I also believe that the discussions that are going to be taking place are going to be very important even if China and Russia are not there. China has reported that they recognize they will be getting a readout of the meeting. So they do recognize that while they’re not there that they will be getting a readout and so they realize at least that that’s going to be important for them. But it will be important regardless because it will give an opportunity for the countries who are at the meeting to discuss issues related to the nuclear situation in North Korea and other issues of importance regarding North Korea, not just the nuclear situation, but they can also look at some of these other issues dealing with chemical, biological issues or even transit of illicit materials. So it’s an opportunity to really get together and have a discussion, have a unified front, and also to look at other possibilities and options to address the situation in North Korea.
Vassy Kapelos: Mr. Grinius, do you think we have to sort of manage expectations about this summit? Is it significant to you that those two countries won’t be there?
Marcus Grinius: It’s not particularly significant from my perspective. I mean it is truly an eclectic group of people and collectively I think there’ll be the opportunity to indicate, convey all the concerns that we have with North Korea’s nuclear program. And certainly it’s the primacy of diplomacy will be the emphasis, I think, in terms of other options that may not be as good, like military options. What I have found with China and Russia not being there, it’s almost as if they’re not happy and they’ve expressed their unhappiness with that meeting. But my suspicion is that in actual fact, any meeting about North Korea where they do not participate, where they do not have a veto or a threat of a veto, makes them unhappy. And certainly from my perspective they have a lot more to do to implement the U.N. sanctions that are supposedly in place.
Vassy Kapelos: When the meeting was first organized things were at a very tense point with North Korea. In the past week we’ve seen some developments, for example, North Korea is sending athletes to the Olympics. They’re embarking on military talks with South Korea. Does that change the nature or change how consequential what could be coming out of this meetings are? And Canadian officials seem to kind of dismiss them in my conversations as small signs. Do you agree?
Marcus Grinius: Not really. Again, it’ll be a very, very interesting opportunity for discussions in the sense that I expect that South Korea’s Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha will be there. And she will be able to give a briefing in terms of what the north-south talks were like in PyeongChang last Tuesday. And also, I think had the opportunity to say here’s what South Korea, I think the key player in all this, thinks in terms of the steps ahead and what have you. So again, it’ll be an interesting conversation even though Russia and China are not going to be there.
Vassy Kapelos: And Ms. Jenkins, another key player of course is the U.S. who will be represented by Rex Tillerson. Even if there is a show of real solidarity and support for a diplomatic solution that includes Mr. Tillerson at the end of this summit, how much weight do you give that, given we know there’s a disconnect between Mr. Tillerson and Mr. Trump and given that we know Mr. Trump is about as unpredictable a leader as it gets?
Bonnie Jenkins: Well I think we still have to work within the situation that we’re in. We are aware that there has been a disconnect, as you said, between Tillerson and Trump, and there is some unpredictability of course coming from the White House on these issues regarding diplomacy in North Korea. However, that does not negate the fact that we still need to have these kinds of discussions. We still need to be promoting diplomacy. It’s good that Secretary Tillerson is going to be going there and promoting it, even if there’s been some rumours about his own job. So, despite all of that I think we still need to be moving forward doing these diplomatic negotiations or promoting these diplomatic negotiations, doing what can be done to develop a strategic approach to how we address North Korea that leans our diplomacy very heavily. And then we’ll have to see what happens with what comes from the White House, but we can’t let that pretty much dictate what’s going to happen on the side of trying to promote diplomacy.
Vassy Kapelos: What do you read in, Ms. Jenkins, to some comments coming from the president from a readout from last week in which he said he was open to sitting down at some point and talking? Do you give a lot of credence to those comments?
Bonnie Jenkins: Well I mean it’s something that Secretary Tillerson has been saying from the very beginning is that there is always an open door to negotiation. There was always an open door to diplomacy. Of course we’ve had some questions as to whether that’s really the case, but there’s always been a part of the U.S. government that’s been saying we want to have diplomacy backed by strong military options. I think it’s great if President Trump is saying that he’s open to negotiations. Of course he’s going to continue to say that those negotiations will have to focus on the option and the need for North Korea to denuclearize, something that North Korea has said it doesn’t want to do. But it’s still important that we hear that from President Trump and hopefully he will follow through on that. And it’s important that Secretary Tillerson continue to do his job, which is diplomacy to lead to some kind of solution to the situation.
Vassy Kapelos: And moving, Mr. Grinius, from the U.S. role to Canada’s role. It seems like there is at least desire on the part of the government to provide some leadership in this area, Canadian leadership. How limited is that by the fact that we—I mean you were one of the last people to represent our country to North Korea. That diplomatic relationship was suspended in 2010 and that decision has not been reversed. Should it be reversed?
Vassy Kapelos: I just have a few seconds, but really quickly. Was it a mistake to suspend the program in the first place?
Marcus Grinius: I think it was. There were reasons for it, the sinking of the South Korean naval vessel. But diplomacy works best when you talk to your enemies, your possible enemies, like we did with Soviet Union or China at the Tiananmen’s Massacre.
Vassy Kapelos: Okay. We’ll have to leave it there, but thanks very much Mr. Grinius and Ms. Jenkins for your time. I appreciate it.
Marcus Grinius: A pleasure.
Bonnie Jenkins: Thank you.
Vassy Kapelos: Up next, a conversation with Canada’s outgoing ethics commissioner. What she thinks about the accusation Justin Trudeau broke the law.
Vassy Kapelos: Welcome back. Last week, Mary Dawson stepped down after serving as Canada’s ethics commissioner for a decade. Her last investigation was her most significant, she found Prime Minister Justin Trudeau guilty of breaking ethics rules. I sat down with Dawson on one of her last days in the office. Have a listen.
Okay. Thanks so much for joining us, Ms. Dawson. I appreciate you being on the program. Congratulations on your official retirement or second retirement really, I should say.
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Thank you.
Vassy Kapelos: I wanted to start off by asking you about the report that you finished at the end of the year and that you made public, the investigation into the vacation the prime minister took to the Aga Khan’s private island. When was your final report delivered to his office?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Usually they’re delivered and they’re given an hour or two to kind of—and they’re given a heads up the night before that it’s coming. But they get about two hours, an hour and a half, something.
Vassy Kapelos: It was the lengthiest one that you’d ever done.
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: It was the longest report. It’s almost twice as long as the nearest longest. Yeah, I was very—there were a lot of aspects to it. You know, there were, I think, seven provisions I was looking into.
Vassy Kapelos: Was this something you wanted to get done before your time in office ended?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: I very badly wanted it to get done. I really didn’t—I don’t like leaving things unfinished.
Vassy Kapelos: There have been some critics who have said that your time in office you could have used sort of a heavier hand in applying the act. Was going out with a bang a response to those critics?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: No, no. In fact, that was an offhand comment. I don’t know it was sort of a joke, you know. In fact, you know, I’ll find contraventions where there are contraventions, but I’m not going to make them up. They are what they are and they come along when they come along.
Vassy Kapelos: You’ve talked often about how you apply the act. You interpret the act as it is.
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Mm-hum.
Vassy Kapelos: But you have made recommendations to strengthen the act that were not implemented by the previous government or this government.
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Right. I’ve made many, many recommendations.
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Yeah, yeah.
Vassy Kapelos: What do you make of the fact that no government has implemented them?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Well, I think they just had other priorities they’d rather deal with. I mean—
Vassy Kapelos: Than their own ethical considerations?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Well, that’s what it would appear. I mean they made—you know they looked at my recommendations. And in fact, the report was not a great one that they come out with. A lot of it didn’t have to do with the recommendations that had been brought and it got some negative comment from the other parties at the time that their report came out. And it’s unfortunate, but that’s what happened.
Vassy Kapelos: Were you disappointed that the political will wasn’t there at the time?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Well you know, I think it takes a certain number of years, like this was a new piece of legislation that the previous government actually brought in. It was their first piece of legislation as a matter of fact. And I know that Mr. Harper felt quite strongly that it was important, but only five years had gone by. The interesting thing is there’s only one mandatory five-year review of the act. There’s a five-year every five-year review of the code for MPs. So this was their one chance, but I believe they’re going to be looking at it again next month. That’s what they’re saying.
Vassy Kapelos: Is it a bit rich that now all these MPs who are somewhat critical of the deficiencies of the act didn’t change it when they could?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Well, it wasn’t their priority I guess. There was a long period between when the proposals went in too and when it was ultimately dealt with, and particularly with the code there was a number of years that went by. But in fact, they did make a number of amendments to the code. Just before the last government went out they brought in about eight or 10 amendments and they were good.
Vassy Kapelos: So let me ask you, you say that you think there’s a will now to update the act or to strengthen–?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: It sounds like it, yeah.
Vassy Kapelos: If you were to pick one recommendation that you think would be the most important to implement going forward, what would it be?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: I think the exception for friends creates problems in the gift provision, for example. Whether that exception’s there or not, the rule reasonably seemed to have been given to influence would achieve the same purpose, I think. Without that exception it would be less confusing.
Vassy Kapelos: What is your advice to your successor?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Just see the course, I think. I think the office is actually in very good shape right now. It’s got a good staff. It’s got lots of experience. There’s 10 years’ worth of precedence now that can be drawn upon. Lots of guidelines that have been produced and guidelines are always good. So I’d just say stay the course.
Vassy Kapelos: Is there anything you would have done differently?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Not that I can think of. I really feel that I’ve done a pretty good job basically. I think that I’ve tried my best and applied myself to it and tried to be careful with my decisions.
Vassy Kapelos: And do the people who say your office should have more teeth, your response?
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Well, I don’t know if that means I should penalties, imprisonment, or big fines, or something. I’m actually not a believer in big fines for these kinds of contraventions. I think the fact that they’re made public, the fact that the public notices, the fact that the contravention is highlighted, I think is important. I think it’s for the electorate to decide in the long-run how they think people have performed. I don’t think the penalties would play a big part or they don’t need to. Big extensive penalties belong in the criminal domain. Once you get into the criminal area, I have to hand it over to criminal authorities.
Vassy Kapelos: So the prime minister in your view didn’t commit a crime—
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: No, no.
Vassy Kapelos: Because somebody asked him the other day—
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: No, it’s a contravention. I used a different term: contravention or offence. And contravention is when you’ve done something that isn’t a criminal level.
Vassy Kapelos: Understood. Well we’ll leave it there. Thanks very much for your time. I appreciate it.
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Well thank you.
Vassy Kapelos: And good luck in retirement.
Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson: Thank you very much.
Vassy Kapelos: Thank you.
And that is our show for today. Thanks for joining us. I’m Vassy Kapelos. See you back here, next week.
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