Thank you for having us.
To start I'll just provide a quick background about the Canadian Free Trade Agreement. The CFTA, as it's also known, came into force on July 1 of this year, and it's a successor to the Agreement on Internal Trade, or the AIT. The CFTA commits federal, provincial, and territorial governments to a comprehensive set of rules that will help to achieve a modern and competitive economic union for all Canadians.
In order for the Government of Canada to implement certain aspects of the CFTA, associated legislative changes are needed. As such, division 10 of part 5 would enact the Canadian Free Trade Agreement implementation act. It's based heavily upon the implementing legislation for the Agreement on Internal Trade. The nature of its provisions are mostly administrative. The act would establish the responsible CFTA minister, facilitate dispute settlement, permit the award of monetary penalties, allow the appointment of committee members and panellists for disputes, and authorize federal funding for the intergovernmental CFTA secretariat.
Given that the CFTA replaces the AIT, the Canadian Free Trade Agreement implementation act would also repeal the Agreement on Internal Trade Implementation Act.
In order to further demonstrate federal leadership on internal trade, division 10 of part 5 would also propose three amendments to the Energy Efficiency Act, or EEA. First, the EEA would be amended to provide the Minister of Natural Resources with the authority to make technical or administrative changes to existing Governor in Council regulations. These changes must be for the purpose of maintaining harmonization with another jurisdiction.
Secondly, the EEA would be amended to provide the Governor in Council with the authority to incorporate by reference technical standards documents for the purposes of harmonizing with another jurisdiction.
Lastly, section 26 of the EEA would be repealed, which is a requirement to pre-publish regulations in Canada Gazette, part 1, which is duplicative of a Treasury Board directive.
The above changes to the EEA will provide new tools that will allow for the Government of Canada to create consistency in standards across the country, and to ensure that Canada is aligned with other key trading jurisdictions.
Division 10 of part 5 also proposes consequential amendments to the Financial Administration Act, the Department of Public Works and Government Services Act, and the procurement ombudsman regulations by replacing references to the Agreement on Internal Trade with references to the new CFTA.
This division would also repeal the Timber Marking Act. The Timber Marking Act is an outdated federal law from 1870 that applies to only three provinces: Ontario, Quebec, and New Brunswick. It mandates that anyone floating timber on rivers in those provinces must mark the logs and register that mark. As such, it is de facto discriminatory, making it contrary to the non-discriminatory treatment obligation under the CFTA. A formal consultation on the repeal of the Timber Marking Act was held, and all stakeholders who provided comments expressed support for the proposed repeal and did not anticipate any negative impact as a result.
Division 10 of part 5 would be deemed to have come into force on July 1, 2017, to coincide with the coming into force of the CFTA, providing continuity. The proposed legislative changes contained in division 10 of part 5 are not controversial, given that any substantive changes pertaining directly to the CFTA were accepted by provinces and territories during the course of the negotiations, or in the case of the EEA amendments were the subject of consultations in which industry stakeholders, as well as provinces, were highly supportive.
We'd be pleased to take any questions you may have.