The Council of Canadians, Canada's largest citizens' advocacy group, has been following SPP developments since it was launched in March of 2005. Our organization is not against international co-operation. We are concerned, however, about the nature of the co-operation between the executive branches of our government and the big business community established by the SPP.
Launched in March of 2005, the SPP is the culmination of an intense campaign by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, Canada's influential big business lobby group, to maintain smooth trade relations with the United States in the aftermath of 9/11. The role of the big business community was formalized in March of 2006 through the creation of the North American Competitiveness Council — an advisory body comprised of 30 of North America's richest corporations.
In a post-9/11 world where, for the Bush administration, security trumps trade, the Canadian and Mexican governments have agreed to fully integrate their security apparatuses with the U.S. and participate in its "war on terror" in return for vague assurances of continued market access for their largest corporations.
One need only look at Maher Arar's situation for a concrete example of the impacts of integrating with the U.S. security apparatus. What our government attempted to prevent us from knowing in the blacked-out portions of Mr. Justice Dennis O'Connor's report, is precisely what it is promoting through the SPP.
Canadian authorities were complicit in the U.S. detention of Maher Arar and were fully aware of the decision to deport him to Syria. This was the result of greater security and intelligence sharing through the "smart border" initiative. The SPP will only make the situation worse by strengthening these ties. Let's not forget that the U.S. government has not admitted to any wrongdoing in the case of Maher Arar.
And the SPP is even broader than this.
In dismissing critics of the SPP as conspiracy theorists, government and business proponents of the deal point to the more benign aspects of regulatory harmonization, such as harmonizing the colour of margarine, protecting North American birds or dealing with pandemics.
What they fail to talk about is that the SPP also calls for energy-sector integration and a potential common external tariff, which will make independent Canadian policies on the environment and energy impossible.
The bulk of the SPP agenda is actually advanced outside these highly publicized leaders' summits through dozens of "working groups" that meet throughout the year. Less publicized meetings have brought corporate leaders, top military brass and government officials from all three countries to discuss North American integration.
In September of 2006, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day joined a host of Canadian, U.S. and Mexican military officers and other government representatives in a closed-door meeting in Banff called the North American Forum. Leaked documents show that at least one participant said that integration will happen as a process of "evolution by stealth." In April of 2006, another closed-door meeting related to the SPP, organized by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies and paid for by the U.S. government, discussed bulk water exports from Canada to the United States.
Don't expect any of this to surface next week, when our leaders deliver their prepackaged statement to the media. We are much more likely to hear about common strategies for pandemics and a continental plan for "renewable energy." And some in the media, who only pay attention to the SPP during these summits, will use this to dismiss SPP opponents as anti-American nationalists.
The reality is that if our government wanted to co-operate with other governments to promote higher environmental or human-rights standards — say, for example, by adopting the Kyoto Protocol or recognizing the right to water — the Council of Canadians would be first in line to congratulate it.
The Council of Canadians has invited the Conservative government to justify its position in what we hoped would be an all-party public debate on the SPP on the eve of the leaders' summit. All opposition parties, including the Liberal Party, who launched the SPP in the first place, have agreed to attend. The Conservative Party has declined. So much for the Harper government's commitment to transparency.
Stephen Harper promised to take all major international treaties before the House but our elected officials have been left in the dark regarding the SPP. In fact, there has been no parliamentary debate about the SPP in any of the three countries.
It's about time the leaders of all three NAFTA countries respect the fundamentals of democratic accountability and open the SPP up to public and parliamentary scrutiny.
Maude Barlow is the national chairperson of the Council of Canadians and author of the upcoming book, Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis and the Fight for the Right to Water.
