The Softwood Deal: The Best Laid Plans...gang aft aglee

Moderators: Elvis, DrVolin, Jeff

The Softwood Deal: The Best Laid Plans...gang aft aglee

Postby greencrow0 » Sat Sep 30, 2006 1:40 am

from canada.com<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Ottawa postpones softwood deal start by one month: official</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> <br><br>The Canadian Press<br>Published: Friday, September 29, 2006 <br><br>VANCOUVER -- On the eve of its Sunday launch date, the federal government announced it is postponing implementation of its contentious softwood lumber deal with the United States for a month.<br><br>“Canada and the United States have agreed to extend the implementation date to no later than Nov. 1,” Bob Klager, communications director for International Trade Minister David Emerson, said late Friday afternoon.<br><br>“Industry has asked for a limited extension on this just due to the complexities of trying to implement it.”<br><br>Emerson was unavailable but said in a news release the extension came after close consultation and in direct response to a request from the industry.<br><br>“The Softwood Lumber Agreement was negotiated in close co-operation with our softwood lumber industry and the provinces,” he said. <br><br>“In this spirit of co-operation, our government has responded to requests from industry to allow them more time to complete the complex but necessary paperwork required on both sides of the border.”<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>The announcement was not a surprise following news earlier this week that a number of lumber exporters were refusing to withdraw their legal actions in U.S. courts against punitive American lumber duties.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>The United States had made killing those cases a precondition for revoking the duties and clearing the way for implementing the seven-year managed trade deal.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>On Wednesday, the B.C. Lumber Trade Council said it had asked Ottawa to delay implementation of the agreement while the legal issues are dealt with.<br><br>The agreement, among other things, replaces the duties with a Canadian export tax that was supposed to start being levied Sunday once the duties were lifted.<br><br>With the duties still in place, Ottawa had no choice but to shelve implementation, which included a Canadian-levied border tax, because lumber shipments would have been taxed going and coming at the border.<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>“Surprise,” said David Gray, a Vancouver lumber-mill owner and B.C. spokesman the for Free Trade Lumber Council. He has been one of the deal’s main critics.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>The agreement required Canadian firms to sign over their right to duty refunds to the federal Export Development Corp. so some of the roughly US$5 billion could be retained by the U.S. government and American producers. The EDC would, in turn, give exporters 80 per cent of the duties they had paid.<br><br>A number of companies have refused to sign over their rights but Ottawa was expected to use taxpayer money to ensure the Americans received the guaranteed US$1 billion.<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>However, the U.S. stipulation that all lumber-related trade cases be withdrawn was impossible to finesse, said Gray.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>“The last I heard, it was 86 companies out of the 400 or so had not signed,” he said. “I think that’s their single most important issue.<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>“Our rights are our rights in American courts and I don’t know how they can take that away from us.”</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>In his release, Emerson also alluded to an impending decision from the U.S. Court of International Trade, which earlier ruled the U.S. government had no right to the duties after NAFTA panels found Canadian lumber posed no threat of injury to U.S. producers.<br><br>A followup ruling on the return of the duties has been expected any day but U.S. and Canadian government lawyers have argued it’s not necessary because of the negotiated settlement. <br><br>Critics claim the court is more likely to issue the ruling if it believes the deal is floundering.<br><br>Klager played down the significance of the legal holdouts as a reason for the delay.<br><br>“It’s really just honestly an administrative, technical issue,” he said. “It’s just a very complex procedure to go through.<br><br>“This should not impact at all the swift return of duties to Canadian companies.”<br><br>Klager said the postponement will not impede the process of refunding the duties within four to eight weeks of companies filling out the necessary paperwork for the EDC.<br><br>“Many, many, many companies have done that,” he said.<br><br>But <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>Gray said he now expects Ottawa to increase the pressure on holdout companies that believe their export business.<br><br>“If the past tells us anything about this current government and how they’re behaving, they’re just kind of rummaging around the closet to try and find a big stick to pound in those recalcitrant, unco-operative non-participants,” he said. <br><br>“I think the worse they get, the worse they’ll look, so they’re going to have to rethink this very carefully.”</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>=====================<br><br>Anyone smell a late fall/early winter 'election' in the air?<br><br>gc <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=greencrow0>greencrow0</A> at: 9/29/06 11:40 pm<br></i>
greencrow0
 
Posts: 1481
Joined: Mon Jul 11, 2005 5:42 pm
Blog: View Blog (0)

The Softwood Deal:

Postby * » Sat Sep 30, 2006 12:30 pm

<br><!--EZCODE IMAGE START--><img src="http://thetyee.ca/Views/2006/08/29/Harper-Bush.png" style="border:0;"/><!--EZCODE IMAGE END--><br><br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://thetyee.ca/Views/2006/08/29/SlushFund/">Bush 'Slush Fund,' Courtesy of Canada</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--> <p></p><i></i>
*
 
Posts: 315
Joined: Thu Sep 01, 2005 9:48 pm
Blog: View Blog (0)


Return to Deep Politics

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 7 guests