Corporate Canada shifts focus to EU
OTTAWA Feeling a sense of relief following Donald Trump’s remarks on the future of U.S. trade with Canada, business leaders are now hoping for a second wave of positive news out of Europe.
Corporate Canada is shifting its focus to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s trip across the Atlantic later this week.
Trudeau’s visit is expected to coincide with the European Union’s ratification vote on its free-trade deal with Canada, an agreement nearly scuttled last fall due to opposition from a small region in Belgium.
“The prime minister is now off to hopefully put (the Canada-EU free trade deal) in his pocket and bring it home from Europe, which would also be good news,” John Manley, president of the Business Council of Canada, said in an interview.
Canada is expected to ratify the deal after the European Parliament gives its OK, which is expected to come Wednesday. The next day, Trudeau will arrive in Strasbourg, France, where he will extol the merits of liberalized trade in a speech to the European Parliament.
The deal will still need the approval of the EU’s 28 national parliaments as well as some regional governments. But 90 per cent of the deal is expected to come into force under what is known as provisional application.
Trudeau will then travel to Berlin for a meeting with Chancellor Angela Merkel, where the trade message is expected to be reinforced. Trudeau will also pay his respects at the Berlin Christmas market, where 12 people were killed after a truck driven by a Tunisian asylum seeker rammed a Christmas celebration in December.
Business leaders in Canada said they were somewhat comforted by Trump’s comments Monday after his first face-to-face meeting with Trudeau.
In particular, they highlighted the president’s remark that the U.S. was in favour of “tweaking” the North American Free Trade Agreement, rather than ripping up or dramatically changing the deal, as Trump had vowed to do during the election campaign.