NAFTA threat will backfire: Trudeau
Trump’s tariff ultimatum has ‘negative impact’
MONTREAL• Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told steel and aluminum workers that he “had their backs” as he fought against proposed tariffs by U.S. President Donald Trump.
The prime minister — on a cross- country tour of aluminum and steel factories — was speaking as Trump faced a global onslaught from countries that warned him against a damaging trade war or heading down a “dead end” road of protectionism.
At talks between economy ministers in Brussels, Spanish Economy Minister Roman Escolano Olivares said, “protectionism is always a political, a historical error.”
“We are worried ( about) the possibility of having a trade war between the United States and the EU because we believe t hat there will be only losers. We believe that protectionism is a dead end,” French Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire told reporters.
On both side soft he Atlantic, automakers, including Ford, Volkswagen, Toyota, Volvo and PSA Group, said all sides would suffer in a trade war.
“There’s no winner in any trade war,” Didier Leroy, executive vice president at Toyota, said after Trump tweeted over the weekend that European cars “freely pour” into the U.S.
“I think the American government knows t hat in the past we had agreements like NA FT A that shouldn’t just be destroyed on a whim,” Volkswagen CEO Matthias Mueller said. “We all put our efforts into globalization in the past decades, and I think we shouldn’t give up that idea.”
China has warned that any trade war would bring disaster to the global economy.
Trump said last Thursday that he was slapping tariffs of 25 per cent on imported steel and 10 per cent on aluminum. He temporarily exempted big steel producers Canada and Mexico — provided they agree to renegotiate a North American trade deal to his satisfaction.
Trudeau said Monday that he told Trump dur- ing a recent phone call that putting duties on Canadian steel and aluminum would hurt ongoing NAFTA negotiations.
“I told the president that imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum does not help with regard to NAFTA,” Trudeau said. “It has a negative impact on the NAFTA talks.
“To impose tariffs that would hurt workers on both sides of the border — it’s not like that that we’ll negotiate a better NAFTA deal.”
Trudeau also said it was in part due to the hard work of Canadian officials that Trump exempted Canada from the tariffs last week.
“Make no mistake — this was a true Team Canada effort and it will continue to be, moving forward,” he told a news conference at the Rio Tinto Alcan aluminum plant in Saguenay, about 250 kilometres north of Quebec City.
Asked what he would do if Trump changed course and imposed duties on Canada, Trudeau said, “we’ll see when we get to that point.”
“But I accept what the president said,” Trudeau added, “that as long as there is a free- trade deal in North America there won’t be tariffs.”
“The exemption represented a positive step in the right direction but we still have a lot more work to do,” Trudeau told the room full of aluminum workers. “We had your backs last week and we always will.”
Canada is t he United States’ largest foreign provider of steel and aluminum, with about 85 per cent of Canadian exports being directed to that country.
Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard spoke to reporters alongside Trudeau and said he wouldn’t accept any undue pressure on the province’s dairy farmers as a potential compromise in the steel and aluminum conflict.
Trump and his trade officials have signalled in the past they are looking for more access to Canada’s dairy market within a renegotiated NAFTA deal.
Quebec has a supply management system regarding dairy, poultry and eggs that imposes steep tariffs on those products entering the country.
“On our end we are going to vigorously defend supply management,” Couillard said, adding Quebec’s farmers have already given up market share for other recently negotiated trade deals.