Monday March 12, 2001

 

Mr. Bill Blaikie (Winnipeg—Transcona, NDP): Mr. Speaker, the minister of trade once made a commitment to me in committee that he would sign no more free trade agreements that included investor state dispute settlement mechanisms like we find in chapter 11 of NAFTA.

Could he tell us whether the government is committed to not signing any free trade agreement, or even negotiating one in Quebec City, that includes any kind of investor state dispute settlement mechanism pursuant to the commitment that he made to me on the record in committee last year?

 

Hon. Pierre Pettigrew (Minister for International Trade, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, I have been very clear on that issue. Canada has offered leadership to our NAFTA partners. We need clarification to make sure that chapter 11 really respects the intentions of the drafters of that agreement.

I made the commitment that we would of course not sign another agreement that would have the kind of clauses that we are seeking to clarify right now.

Obviously there are important elements related to investment because we have a lot of Canadian investments abroad and we have a responsibility vis-à-vis them as well, but we will not go to the sort of things we are seeking to clarify in chapter 11 and on which we are making good progress.