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Stephen Kelly: Our free trade relationship with America should be our highest priority. Why aren’t we acting like it?

Commentary

Canadian and American flags fly near the Ambassador Bridge at the Canada-USA border crossing in Windsor, Ont., March 21, 2020. Rob Gurdebeke/The Canadian Press.

I’ll start with a confession. My position in favour of free trade with the United States was given to me at birth. As a teen, my father campaigned for the side supporting economic union with the U.S. in the initial referendum on the future of Newfoundland and Labrador. (He also gave me my party politics—a legacy of his disdain for the winning side of Joey Smallwood and Liberals.)

I believe that Canada’s trade relationship with the U.S. matters more than almost everything else. I supported John Crosbie, the free trade candidate, in the 1983 Progressive Conservative Leadership. After three ballots, I voted for the opponent of U.S. free trade, Brian Mulroney. And later, I lived the rich irony of being one of many staffers and security detail needed to take free trade-supporting Prime Minister Mulroney through one anti-free trade protest after another in the fabled 1988 free trade election.

Some four decades since the immaculate conversion of Mulroney to the cause of free trade, I’ll also confess to being disappointed in the emphasis his successors placed on the file. This may just reflect the enormity of Mulroney’s achievement as much as their evident disinterest in trying to match it.

But more than anything, I’m heartened by the broad consensus amongst Canadians in favour of U.S. free trade. I suspect it’s this consensus that will serve us better than any of the players navigating what will be very challenging times for our side.

I say this because of late, Canada’s pioneering effort in trade deal-making seems to have a case of innovator’s dilemma. Perhaps in the process of building a successful trade relationship, we’ve professionalized and regularized the machinery to the degree that details of trade now obscure the art of trade deal-making. Form and forum matter while attention to the changing circumstances of our national interest matters less.

The innovator dilemma timing couldn’t be worse. First, we spent most of the last four years entertaining one another with tales of free trade’s near-death experience under Donald Trump, rather than taking a cold hard look at what we tried to accomplish, why, and how we did.

Now, Canada finds itself on the clock, counting down to a review agreed to as part of the last round of negotiations. This review, for Canada, should be a priority for all. But light probing suggests that we’ve wrapped our collective selves around the process axle known as Ottawa.

For those who are new, today’s Ottawa is known for an efficient vote where everything is done to serve its (ever-dwindling) efficiency. This Ottawa is not electorally inclined to play to Canada’s strengths—“come for the LNG, leave with brochures about hydrogen” makes that point self-evident.

As I see it, it’s unlikely that management by Ottawa is going to get us out from under troubling trends in Canada-U.S. trade. These suggest the U.S. side will come to the table from a position of greater strength, further exasperating the asymmetrical challenge that is the core of our relationship.

I’m on about this because my own read says that in the last twenty years—primarily on energy but on many policy fronts—the U.S. has moved forward on economic issues critical to Canada’s national interest but in ways that either harm or are neglectful of our interests. Canada’s typical response has been either muted acceptance or grumbling acquiescence.

I believe a significant course correction is in order and we’ve perhaps lost track of the fact that the onus is always on Canada to make ourselves indispensable to the world’s only indispensable nation.

And as such, I say the ground is ripe for voices outside of Ottawa, from the pioneers from the ‘80s and the exporters of today and tomorrow, to capture and define a bold vision for U.S.-Canada trade—one anchored in continental energy security and focused on how to create greater economic advantage from our shared energy resources, metals, and minerals core to any energy future, technologies, markets, and interests as the means to achieve long term competitive advantage for us, greater energy security for our allies, and shared climate objectives.

The public sentiment of our times reflects a world Canadians see as less secure. Be it the drumbeat of climate change, war in Europe, conflict in the Middle East, tariffs and talk of trade wars. At the end of the day, Canadians want a free trade agreement that builds security and manages uncertainty. Collectively, we should be able to deliver. And waiting for Ottawa to sort out what fits their efficient vote would be a step backwards in such an effort.

Stephen Kelly

Stephen Kelly is an executive advisor whose career has focused on the proposition that meaningful work with good people is the best use of one's time. Along with a stint on Bay St. to cover the bills.

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