{"id":77872,"date":"2020-09-29T17:45:22","date_gmt":"2020-09-29T14:45:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/softwood-lumber-the-canada-u-s-trade-spat-that-never-ends\/"},"modified":"2020-09-29T17:45:22","modified_gmt":"2020-09-29T14:45:22","slug":"softwood-lumber-the-canada-u-s-trade-spat-that-never-ends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/softwood-lumber-the-canada-u-s-trade-spat-that-never-ends\/","title":{"rendered":"#Softwood lumber: The Canada-U.S. trade spat that never ends"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Softwood lumber: The Canada-U.S. trade spat that never ends<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n Politics Insider for Sept. 29: The two biggest USMCA partners keep up a decades-long fight over lumber, Ontario announced 700 new COVID cases and CSIS celebrates Good Neighbour Day\n <\/div>\n
\n Welcome to a sneak peek of the\u00a0<\/em>Maclean\u2019s\u00a0Politics Insider\u00a0news<\/a>letter.\u00a0Sign up to get it delivered\u00a0straight to your inbox.<\/em><\/p>\n

It had been a few weeks since a Canada-U.S. trade spat<\/strong> was in the news. Yesterday, Trade Minister Mary Ng<\/strong> lashed out at Americans for app<\/a>ealing a World Trade Organization ruling on softwood lumber duties that favoured the Canadian argument. Ng\u2019s press release<\/a> was fairly direct, but Canada\u2019s statement<\/a> at the WTO dispute settlement body used even stronger language<\/strong>.\u00a0\u201cCanada is deeply concerned by the United States\u2019 actions which frustrate the proper functioning of the dispute settlement system,\u201d read the statement. \u201cThe United States\u2019 behaviour significantly reduces the security and predictability that we collectively value in international trade.\u201d<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the first time Canada and the U.S. have clashed at the WTO in recent years. In the midst of NAFTA renegotiations in 2017, Canada filed a massive set of complaints<\/strong><\/a> against American trade practices. In response, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer<\/strong>\u00a0called the filing a \u201cbroad and ill-advised attack\u201d that is \u201cunfounded.\u201d Yesterday\u2019s Canadian statement took a shot at Lighthizer: \u201cCanada was surprised that the United States has appealed given the stated position of the U.S. Trade Representative that there is no need for an Appellate Body. \u201d<\/p>\n

Yesterday, Ontario Premier\u00a0Doug Ford<\/strong> warned that the province\u2019s second wave of COVID-19 could turn into a \u201ctsunami.\u201d At a daily briefing, the premier said the province would spend millions on hiring health-care workers. And he urged Ontarians to consider a career on the front lines. \u201cWhether you\u2019re a young person applying to college or university, or someone thinking about their next career, please consider joining the fight,\u201d he said. Earlier in the day, the province announced 700 new cases<\/strong> just as the Ontario Hospital Association urged the government to roll back its reopening<\/a>. Read Ford\u2019s full remarks<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Until now, no Canadian had ever run for the presidency of the Inter-Parliamentary Union<\/strong>, a global group of cooperative elected people. But Salma Ataullahjan<\/strong>, a Conservative senator from Ontario, threw her hat into the ring.\u00a0Ataullahjan has worked with the IPU for a decade and currently heads up its committee on \u201cMiddle East Questions.\u201d The IPU is another international org abandoned by Americans<\/strong>, this time in the pre-Trump era. A buried item in a\u00a01998 omnibus bill<\/a>\u00a0terminated the Yanks\u2019 longstanding membership the next year\u2014after the IPU\u2019s executive committee complained the U.S. had literally stopped paying its dues<\/a>.<\/p>\n

NDP MP Rachel Blaney<\/strong> asked the Parliamentary Budget Office to dig into the backlog of disability payment requests<\/strong> facing military veterans. The PBO reported<\/a> that current staffing levels, which have been temporarily increased, would reduce the backlog\u2014which ballooned from 20,693<\/strong> in 2017 to 49,216<\/strong> earlier this year\u2014by about 10,000 applications. If the feds extended those temp jobs into 2023, the backlog could disappear that year. The PBO estimates that Veterans Affairs Canada could eliminate the backlog in 12 months with the help of another 392 temps<\/strong> (whose jobs would cost $33 million this year).<\/p>\n

The federal Greens expressed dismay that a company almost wholly owned by the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board<\/strong> would donate $600,000<\/strong> to a Republican political action committee. In fact, Crestone Peak Resources\u00a0did<\/em> donate a total of $600,000 to three separate pro-Republican PACs<\/strong>\u00a0in 2018. More recently, the company\u2019s CEO co-signed<\/a> a full-page, pro-fracking ad in the\u00a0New York Times<\/em>. The Greens claimed Crestone\u2019s board chair, Avik Dey, works for the CPPIB. In fact, Dey\u2019s off the Crestone board\u2014but the CPPIB still has a rep at that table<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The least glamorous job in politics:<\/strong>\u00a0New Brunswick Liberals appointed Roger Melanson<\/strong> to the job nobody wants<\/em>, per se. Melanson, an MLA since 2010 and a former finance minister, will serve as temporary leader<\/a> after the party\u2019s crushing election defeat earlier this month. It\u2019s a bit of a crisitunity, really.\u00a0Rona Ambrose<\/strong> scored so well in the same role after Stephen Harper<\/strong>\u2018s resignation in 2015 that plenty of Tories hoped she\u2019d run this year.<\/p>\n

Over the weekend, while driving east down Montreal Road, your newsletter correspondent was reminded that the nerve centre of Canada\u2019s intelligence community<\/strong>\u2014the respective HQs of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and Communications Security Establishment\u2014is plainly visible\u00a0across an expansive lawn that stretches south from the National Research Council\u2019s sprawling campus. Yesterday, on #GoodNeighbourDay<\/strong>, CSIS took hiding in plain sight<\/strong> to a new level\u2014tweeting gifs<\/strong><\/a> at its fellow federal agencies.
\n<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n