Our Sovereignty Secretly at Risk
Biggest voter issue off media's radar? Canada's stealthy 'integration' with US.
Harper and Bush: 'The Grand Bargain.'
In February 2003, the vice-president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, in Canadian Senate hearings, said that de facto integration of Canada with the United States was here already "whether many Canadians realize it or want to accept it" and, anyway, we don't need "duplicate systems of approval."
Got that? No need for duplicate systems of approval. I suppose there's no need for the House of Commons or provincial legislatures either. Let's just rubber-stamp American policies, standards and values.
Earlier, the continentalist Financial Post columnist Diane Francis said that "Canada is more integrated with the United States economically than any two European countries are."
The noted Canadian economist Richard Harris and the Carnegie Endowment long ago both said the same thing, back in 2002.
David O'Brien, chairman of the board of the Royal Bank of Canada, has said that Canada would have to adopt U.S. immigration policies.
We're going to lose increasingly our sovereignty, but it's necessarily so.
Patrick Daniels, president of Enbridge, hilariously complains that Canada pushes its sovereignty a little too far.
In June 2006, the North American Competitiveness Council (NACC), consisting of business leaders from each of the three NAFTA countries, was formed "to advise governments."
Toronto lawyer Paul Bigioni called it "an anti-democratic institution."
Secret summits
On the surface, the NACC appears to be an initiative of government. It is not. It was entirely conceived by the private sector. In 2003, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives launched a sales pitch designed to convince governments to pursue such business-friendly initiatives as "re-inventing" borders, regulatory convergence and energy integration. It is no coincidence that the NACC currently pursues the same objectives.
In fact, all of the Canadians on the NACC are members of the powerful CCCE lobby group, and the CCCE serves as the Canadian secretariat. The big business NACC is the only non-governmental organization making recommendations to the secret, tripartite Security Prosperity Partnership discussions.
Top secret meetings -- behind-closed doors -- have already been held, with more of the same planned for the future. These meetings are designed to further integrate Canada into the United States and have us adopt even more American standards, values and policies, and to give Americans even more guaranteed access to our resources and the unimpeded ability to buy up the ownership and control of even more of our country.
Perhaps you do not know about the three days of highly secret meetings that took place at the Banff Springs Hotel in mid-September 2006, meetings between top-level American, Canadian and Mexican government officials and many senior corporate heads.
In fact, probably you don't know. But, then again, why should you know? Despite the fact that the leaked guest list of very high-level VIPs was sent by me to the media along with the agenda, there wasn't a word about the meetings in our two national newspapers the Globe and Mail or The National Post. There was nothing on CBC television, on CTV or on Global, although all were contacted. (The Tyee did run a report.)
'Not for public release'
The documents that I obtained and sent out had been marked beforehand "Internal Document. Not for Public Release." The three heavyweight co-chairs of the secret meetings were former Alberta Conservative premier and strong pro-FTA advocate Peter Lougheed, former U.S. secretary of state George Shultz and former Mexican secretary of the Treasury Pedro Aspe.
Among the many well-known Canadians scheduled as "participants" were Stephen Harper's Conservative cabinet ministers Stockwell Day (who at first denied attending) and the then-defence minister Gordon O'Connor, deputy ministers (Defence) Ward Elcock, Peter Harder (Foreign Affairs), Associate Deputy Minister William Elliott (Public Security), Liberal continentalist Anne McLellan, Canada's former deputy prime minister and a defender of the oil patch, the Alberta minister of energy, Greg Melchin, General Rick Hillier, Canada's chief of defence staff, former Conservative cabinet minister Perrin Beatty, now president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the infamous continentalist Thomas d'Aquino, head of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, Rear Admiral Roger Girouard, Maj.-Gen. Daniel Gosselin, plus numerous top corporate heads, lawyers, petroleum industry officials and others.
Among the many scheduled American participants were the political advisor to the head of the U.S. Northern Command, the president for the Americas of Lockheed Martin Corporation, the senior director for the Western Hemisphere of the American National Security Council, the U.S. Deputy Under Secretary of Defense Carla Hills (who was the primary U.S. NAFTA negotiator), the senior United States Air Force military assistant to the then secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld, the commander of U.S. Northern Command, the chair of the President's Council of Advisors on Science & Technology, Dr. James Schlesinger, the former American secretary of energy & defense, the deputy secretary of energy, plus many other top business, government and military officials, plus representatives of similar groups from Mexico.
In the intended-to-be-secret "internal agenda document" were plans for detailed discussions about economic, energy, security, military and other forms of integration.
'If it isn't a conspiracy...'
After I distributed the list of participants and the agenda to the media and to my e-mail list, many concerned people across Canada phoned the participants seeking more information. Almost no calls were returned, and those that were produced zero answers to the many questions asked as to what was decided at the three-day meeting, who paid for the meetings, who organized them, and why every attempt was made to keep them secret.
Six months after the meetings, Ottawa Citizen reporter Kelly Patterson revealed that:
"Organizers of a controversial summit of top Canadian, U.S. and Mexican politicians, military brass and business executives hired a consulting firm to keep the proceedings secret, access to information documents show.
"A 'media management plan' for the event in Banff last fall imposed a gag order on all participants who were directed 'to avoid direct media engagement where feasible.'"
After I sent him the information I had about the meetings, Peter C. Newman wrote to me: "I tried phoning people I trusted and I thought trusted me, and no one would tell me anything. IF it isn't a conspiracy, they're doing their best to make it appear like one."
A halt to law changes and debate
In February 2007, Teresa Heely of Social and Economic Policy at the Canadian Labour Congress wrote about more closed door meetings. The "Security and Prosperity Partnership" meetings seek "to avoid legislative change and public debate. Democratic debate and decision is making way for privileged corporate access and new rules that undermine sovereignty and human rights."
Knowing that a new government treaty like the FTA or NAFTA for further Canada-U.S. integration would never survive the opposition in Parliament, "Proponents have moved underground to promote 'deep integration.' ...policy harmonization that increasingly opens social life across the continent to the discipline of the market. It is about increasing the power of corporations and ongoing de-regulation."
What 'deep integration' aims to achieve
The so-called "NAFTA-plus" or "deep integration" or "Grand Bargain" being promoted and discussed at these secret meetings plans for the elimination of barriers to even greater foreign ownership and foreign control, the slashing of government spending on social programs, the weakening of prospective environmental regulation, (ensuring there are no barriers to increased energy and resource exports from Canada), and many other policies that will result in even greater control of Canada by the U.S.
This is integration by the powerful via secrecy and stealth, planned by and for the likes of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, the U.S. Council of the Americas and the Center for Strategic Studies, clearly under the guidance and with the financing of the U.S. government in Washington, D.C.
Author Silver Donald Cameron says of the "Security and Prosperity Partnership": "The SPP is the new name for the old American project of Manifest Destiny -- absolute control over the whole continent."
Cameron calls the CCCE, "The Canadian Council of Collaborators."
The backlash in the US
While our own government in Ottawa silently condones the plans for further integration with the U.S., and while our provincial governments continue to be completely sound asleep on this vitally important topic, irony of ironies, at this writing 15 U.S. states have expressed concern that the big business sponsored Security and Prosperity Partnership is a process that, wait for it, is a threat to states' rights and to the sovereignty of the United States. And in July 2007, the U.S. House of Representatives cut some SPP funding because of the group's failure to consult Congress, and the complaint that "They have been intransigent, they have been unresponsive and frankly, they have been secretive."
In August 2007, 22 members of the House of Representatives asked George Bush to back away from the SPP because of their concerns that it may undermine U.S. sovereignty and their strong objections about important discussions continuing "out of public view and without congressional oversight or approval" or the "proper transparency and accountability."
Does anyone think a single person in the entire Harper government has uttered a similar word of complaint? Not a chance.
An insider's notes
On the surface it may appear that not much happened at the August 2007 SPP meetings at Montebello. But Thomas d'Aquino gave the Globe and Mail a hint about what is really happening behind the scenes:
"A lot of work is going on, on the regulatory front, the environmental front, the energy front, the border front... There is a big selling job that has to be done." And he told the National Post that "The Montebello Summit produced significant progress across a range of policy areas.
Shortly after 9-11, he called for "more fundamental harmonization and integration with the U.S." to keep the borders open.
All of this covert, under-the-table planning is happening in Canada despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of Canadians, year after year, in poll after poll after poll, show that they believe that Canada has been too good a country for us to surrender to our greedy and selfish big-business leaders whose values are so very different from those of most Canadians who are still very proud of our country, our culture, our history, our values, our civility and tolerance, and are not the slightest bit interested in further "harmonization and integration" with the U.S.
Democracy eroded
Alas, the compradors, the neo-cons and the continentalists are powerful, well-organized and very well-financed. We now know that the initial SPP agenda included over 300 items. As a spokesman for the CCCE told a House of Commons committee: "Many of these represent very small steps... On the other hand, even 300 small steps, if we take them all, add up to a pretty giant leap for North America."
Testifying to the same Commons committee on the same day, Bruce Campbell, executive director of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, said of the SPP:
"I never hear talk about measures that would encourage upward harmonization of labour or environmental standards... tax measures that would prevent corporations from engaging in transfer pricing or discourage shifting profits to tax havens. This type of cooperation is not on the SPP agenda, and it begs the question: prosperity for whom?
"Convergence and harmonization means... Canada bending its regulations or simply adopting U.S. federal regulations, and I ask the question: at what point does the narrowing of policy room to manoeuvre fundamentally compromise democratic accountability in our political system?"
Voices of dissent
In 2007, a group of well-known Canadians including authors, academics, musicians and former politicians joined forces to oppose further integration with the U.S. They issued a statement:
"Canada faces a stark choice. We can be gradually assimilated and lose our identity as a nation, or we can retain our independence and renew our own unique vision of what we wish for Canada's future... a vision of strong communities, tolerance, equality, environmental stewardship, and a peaceful and constructive role in the world.
"We believe that in spite of recent developments, Canadians believe passionately in the traditional values that guided this country in its post-war nation building.
"The Security and Prosperity Partnership will give us neither security nor prosperity, nor is it a genuine partnership. We stand against this scheme and urge other Canadians to join us."
In August 2007, the National Council of Women of Canada summed it all up nicely in a single paragraph:
"This agreement has not been debated in or sanctioned by our Parliament. We believe that it threatens our sovereignty and puts control of our natural resources such as the Tar Sands and water at risk. For the U.S. government to negotiate a trade agreement manifestly to the advantage of international business interests using the "motherhood and apple pie" issue of security and prevention of terrorism is highly suspect. It's the 21st century version of "if you're not for us, you're against us." For a Canadian government to agree to such an undebated surrender of our sovereignty is shameful and unacceptable.
"We demand that all SPP discussions be brought into the legislative and public domains immediately."
A key election
All of this said, if we use it properly, the one very important thing we have on our side -- democracy -- can overwhelm our own selfish sellouts. Changes in election financing would be a huge step towards diminishing the influence of those who are now actively planning to give our country away.
There's no doubt in my mind that we can stop these sellouts. But for us to do so requires nothing less than a very substantially heightened degree of direct political activism by people who really care about the survival of our country.
Don't be misled by intentionally leaked reports out of Washington that the SPP is dead. The likes of Tom d'Aquino, Raymond Chrétien, John Manley and Allan Gotlieb are powerful, persistent, tenacious and well-connected in both countries. At this writing there are at least 20 cross-border committees working on integration.
Let's be certain that Canadians know of and understand their plans, and let's be certain that we never allow them to succeed.
As this federal election unfolds, Harper has all the advantages of incumbency, a huge war chest of election funds and polls that show Canadians would much prefer him to Mr. Dion as prime minister. Most pundits predict another minority or even a majority Conservative government. If you care about Canada, now is the time to go to work to preserve our sovereignty, our independence, our cherished and special values, and our economic, social and political integrity.
Related Tyee stories:
- Mel Hurtig, Tough Love Patriot
Interview with the author of The Truth About Canada. - Secret Summit on Shared 'Security'
Why was North America's power elite invited to Banff? - The Plan to Disappear Canada
'Deep integration' comes out of shadows.
![[Tyee]](http://thetyee.cachefly.net/ui/img/ico_fishie.png){kind=small}
G West
30-09-2008
I hope you're right Mel
garden bay
30-09-2008
Scary stuff
It will never happen on a national level,yet the Tyee looks the other way while BC IS BEING SOLD TO THE USA, by Campbell
Have you even done one story promoting Harper?
This is almost like reading Canwest Global---Its obvious there are many LIBERAL patronage positions,even here at the TYEE
And I thought the CBC was bad---
Tell me why the Liberals or the NDP aren`t screaming the story from the top of their lungs!
Shame on you Tyee
biscotti
30-09-2008
US intervention in elections
Although Canada barely exists in US media or US public consciousness, you can bet that US decision makers are acutely aware that Canada is now their biggest supplier of oil. So given the history of US intervention in elections around the world, we can assume that they are highly involved in this one, directly or via their corporate lackeys. Maybe some day we'll know just how they're going about it this time.
Linda McQuaig's "The Quick and the Dead" (http://www.lindamcquaig.com/Books.cfm) described the role of American Express in Canada's 1989 free trade election - something that would never have been tolerated if a Canadian corporation had done the same south of the border.
I don't understand why the NDP hasn't made more of an issue out of the SPP, let alone NAFTA Chapter 11 actions like the UPS lawsuit against Canada Post, which could have resulted in challenges to medicare.
Most people I asked about the UPS story while it was going on, including postal workers, postmasters, and card-carrying NDPers, had never heard about it. Only a handle of Council of Canadians members knew what I was talking about.
If we were in Bolivia and this was happening, I can imagine the fate of those brown UPS trucks. Mel is right. Time to wake up, Canada.
politico
01-10-2008
Getting exposure
Can you get a trade agreement or the SPP to drop acid and drive while smoking a doobie on video tape and then ask some young girls to paint its naked body?
I'm just sayin....
Van Isle
01-10-2008
Maybe it's about time that
Maybe it's about time that some of these movers and shakers to a North American Union be charged with treason. To think that our political and military elite swear an oath of allegiance, then go attend meetings that compromise that oath.
freebear
01-10-2008
Where are the opposition parties?
Si where are the voices of the political oppositions?
Or are they also in bed with the sellouts?
Makes it hard who to vote for eh?
Skywalker
01-10-2008
It is too complicated an issue.
Quote: "I don't understand why the NDP hasn't made more of an issue out of the SPP, let alone NAFTA Chapter 11 actions like the UPS lawsuit against Canada Post, which could have resulted in challenges to medicare."
That is not hard. Think of the difficulty Dion is having with his green shift and you might understand wwhy nobody talks about really important issues. The same would happen with "sovereignty" issues. It would take someone with great oratory skills to deal with these issues and relate them to the day to day living.
That being said, Mel is right as usual. Canada is far too much embedded in the white house with Harper. None of these neocons give a fig about Canadian independence on the national scene.
Stephanie T
01-10-2008
Quote "I don't understand
Quote "I don't understand why the NDP hasn't made more of an issue out of the SPP, let alone NAFTA Chapter 11 actions like the UPS lawsuit against Canada Post, which could have resulted in challenges to medicare."
Their platform clearly states that they will renegotiate nafta chapters 11 and 6 as well as other nafta policies that negatively impact Canada's sovereignty. They also state they will cease Canada's participation in the spp negotiations.
And if you think our medical system is safe you might want to read this:
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/subscriber/columnists/top3/story/4229990p-4871159c.html
clubofrome
01-10-2008
Share the Shame!
Shame on the other media for not reporting this. Maybe the global financial crisis will distract these self proclaimed posperity makers for a while as their assets start decreasing to their real value. Less than the paper they were written on... I hope.
wakeywakeyppl
01-10-2008
North American Union is a scary thought
For some of us who do not fully trust the mainstream media this is not surprising news. Bush, Clinton and Martin and now Harper have been working on the North American Union for quite some time. The scary thing is that our mainstream media is not reporting this, this is what is really important for Canadians to know for this coming election. No one mainstream is talking about the SPP or the North American Union and what it all really means for Canadians. If this is a Democracy then why is this information kept secret from the average Canadian?
Most boomers want Harper becasue they think our morals are flying out the window, and that our laws are lax for criminals. But people if you vote him in none of that will change, what will change is that we the people will have gradually less and less say, and Corporations will have more and more. Our Canada is in trouble if left in Harpers hands, it is time to wake up and think about the future not his band-aid fixes for now, like tax cuts.
Just look at our neighbour, since they manufactured 9/11 and the "terrorist myth" hysteria the Bush government has gradually eroded away many simple freedoms for American people. And looking at this so called current financial "crisis", its the stock market people, it goes up and down! The media is scaring us about it, but in truth no one lost anything. The rich can now buy more stocks and will end up owning more and more of America.
Reality is that if we let this North American Unon agenda go through, our health care system, our health freedom, our social programs, Canada Post, our environment, our natural resources, and any other positive thing about our Canada will be sold to corporations and will be taken away from us. It is already happening just ask around. Let's wake up and write to our MP's and the government. We need to stop this in its tracks, we love our Canada!
biscotti
01-10-2008
The gap between platforms and action on the ground
Yes, the NDP's platform mentions SPP and NAFTA Chapter 11. But how many rank and file members or supporters can talk about those issues? And why so few?
For sure, the complexity of these issues has made it difficult to communicate them widely, but I have been more than disappointed by NDP's inability in the last 20 years to find creative ways to explain these issues, involve people and take action. Emails from the NDP have idiotic little reductionist sound bites like "Harper is wrong on X, Y or Z..."
Harper is wrong. Wow. What a strong argument. That'll woo some votes.
I remember the free trade election of 1989 when thousands of Canadians pored through the text of the FTA and debated it passionately. The more people learned from grassroots organizations (and publications like the national newspaper insert with Aislin's cartoon of green-faced Mulroney in an acid rain shower), the more they opposed it. Unfortunately, there wasn't enough time to mobilize enough opposition by the time of the election, and the split vote let Mulroney in.
If so many people could become so informed about something as complex as the FTA, why not SPP and NAFTA?
I sometimes get the impression that the back roomers at NDP HQ don't think working class people have brains. It's really quite insulting. They just carry on with spin doctoring, polling and marketing instead of consciousness-raising and grass roots organizing. And delusions like Jack could be the next PM (Howard Pawley actually said this - not tongue in cheek - on The House on CBC).
I don't think we can wait for any party to do the organizing work for us. It's up to everyone to get the word out.
Skywalker
01-10-2008
Advancing an ideology by stealth.
It is all about advancing an ideology written about by Einstein. He said, "The situation prevailing in an economy based on the private ownership of capital is thus characterized by two main principles: first, means of production (capital) are privately owned and the owners dispose of them as they see fit; second, the labor contract is free."
So if you remove and borders and let capital flow freely, you remove the power of the unions and advance the notion of "free labour" The capitalist machine becomes the ultimate power. More harminizing with the U.S. threatens Canadians social safety net. But then this was the debate that took place before Mulroney forced us into free trade. Now we are suppose to trust Harper, from the Fraser Institute, to do better for us?
clubofrome
01-10-2008
They got smarter!
We were given only the "public consumption" version of free trade to debate. With SPP we don't even get that. That's why their meetings are in secret. It's not up for discussion so it won't be in the MSM. Of course educate ourselves, that way we'll have a chance to understand why we've been herded into urban feedlots. Pass the farmed salmon fish please, Mmmm delicious!
lynn
01-10-2008
Mel Hurtig for Prime Minister
First, thanks to Mel Hurtig for writing this.
Second, thanks to The Tyee for printing this excerpt from his book....along with other articles of his over the years..
Third, there is NO excuse for not bringing the issue of our threatened sovereignty to the fore. If this is not the time to do so ...when exactly would be a good time?
It doesn't take eloquence. It takes political parties that care enough and that are asute enough to see that this is THE central issue around which all other issues revolve. Nothing is of a higher priority. Nothing. If we lose our self-determination as a country we lose everything. How can we effect our future in any way, on any issue? We become eunuchs in our own country.
'Course that is exactly what the intentions of The SPP are.
freebear
01-10-2008
All About Openings!
Just like David Emerson, the movers and shakers like the Council of Canadian Executives are looking at creating openings for even more wealth (mostly personal)generation at the expense of the environment and the public, or common good.
An elction campaign and no discussion or debate?
We all must be too busy attending tux and evening gown cultural events eh!
kootenay
01-10-2008
Mexico really scary
We should continue to be concerned about our intergration with the US. The real scary card is Mexico. Their brand of democracy makes Bush look like a pussy cat.
As Skywalker correctly points out in his post above;
"So if you remove and borders and let capital flow freely, you remove the power of the unions and advance the notion of "free labour" The capitalist machine becomes the ultimate power. "
Take a look at the link below and read how the President of Mexico has dealt with the most powerful labour leader in his country. Napoleon Gomez, leader of the Mining and Metal Workers Union, 250,000 members. Removed from office, faslely accused of crimes, and threatened with death.
http://www.usw.ca/program/content/5288.php
SharingIsGood
01-10-2008
The writing has been on the wall
for years!
Canada has been lashing itself ever tighter to a sinking ship, following the Reagan-Thatcher-Mulroney/Martin/Harper - Bush-Clinton-Bush agenda. I have been watching this country that has changed so dramatically since Trudeau left it. In the early 80s, Canada was nearly completely free to deal with the world how she wanted. A quarter century has passed and Canada has become the patsy of the US corporate/military-industrial complex. Worst of all, British Columbia and Alberta have been the strongest beacons for the rest of Canada to follow as the nation moves headlong into the hands of the selfish neo-conservative entities controlling the United States.
Given that the energy clauses of NAFTA take 20 years to break, it will take Canada 20 years to untie the lines it has thrown to the USS Corporate Empire. It will take another 20 years to buid up the infrastructure that undoing the ties will cause. The oil and gas are not ours, folks. When our grandchildren find themselves cold and hungry - without oil and natural gas, we can say to ourselves, "Ya, we did it all for them."
There is only one PM hopeful who wants to begin the process of extricating Canada from NAFTA - Jack Layton. For no other reason than this, people should be voting NDP.
greengreen
01-10-2008
Get on it, Bigtime
Mr. Beers....Let's get more coverage of this topic! Let's hear from others who have written on this. This topic should not be dropped or covered "once." Since MSM will not touch it, this is the type of story the Tyee should sink it's teeth into.
And yes, I would like to know why the opposition parties are not all over this???????????