Canadians breathed a sigh of relief for a couple hours on Monday.
It was revealed that freshly inaugurated United States President Donald Trump will not immediately impose 25 per cent tariffs on Canadian imports. Rather, it turns out they will be coming into effect on Feb. 1 — maybe.
No matter how long Trump dangles the tariff threat, Canada’s weaknesses on border security and military spending will not disappear. As painful as this game is, at least it got the Liberals moving on a number of neglected issues.
After all, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly just broached the topic of breaking down Canada’s interprovincial trade barriers to strengthen the domestic economy, and has pledged to work to diversify Canada’s trade.
Before Christmas, the federal government announced it was planning to strengthen the border and the immigration system. This all sounds great.
Where was the energy for this years ago? In what world are bolstered trade and national security not first-order items?
It was revealed only in the summer that Canada granted citizenship to a former member of ISIS, while foreign nationals have sought to use Canada as a base from which to attack the United States. The failing vetting process represents a threat to both Canadians and Americans.
In August and September, three men, two Afghans and the other a Pakistani national, were arrested on suspicion of planning to perpetrate acts of terror on both sides of the border. Protests and demonstrations glorifying Hamas and other terrorist groups are routine occurrences in Canadian cities.
How many more young men are out there among them, angry and ready to fight and commit political murder here or in the U.S.? The firm Insight Threat Intelligence has stated that the threat of a terrorist attack in Canada has “rarely been higher.”
It is a unique advantage to share the world’s longest undefended border with its largest and most dynamic economy. Ensuring it remains mostly undefended should prompt Ottawa to take border protection and internal security far more seriously.
Ottawa has just leased, but not bought, a pair of UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters, enough to film a sequel to Black Hawk Down, but likely insufficient for patrolling the 8,891-kilometre Canada-U.S. border. It is still good enough for the targeted monitoring of illegal border crossings, and that is tiny step up from the porous status quo.
Meeting the NATO benchmark of spending two per cent of GDP on national defence is another issue Trump has cited for brandishing tariffs. Canadian governments have not met this for years, regardless of the party in power, and in this changing, ever-more dangerous world, a stronger military must be a priority.
In an encouraging sign, the Canadian Forces have restarted online vignettes promising adventure, camouflage, and assault rifles. Just 12 months ago, media from the military looked and sounded like they were fresh off the HR consultant’s assembly line, largely devoid of traditional military symbols and saturated with progressive social values.
A start is a start, and whatever gets Canada closer to meeting its spending commitments on the military, including bolstering recruitment, is welcome.
When greeting the news of the delayed tariffs, Joly mentioned that the government would remain focused on trade diversification. What exactly is she planning to diversify?
The North American auto market is deeply integrated, and Canada can only claim to participate in, rather than control it. Oil and gas, on the other hand, is a far more sovereign industry and should be capitalized on.
Had the Liberals not smothered projects like Northern Gateway and Energy East to death with a fat pillow stuffed with green regulations or outright cancellation, Canada might have oil exports flowing from both the Atlantic and the Pacific.
Thus far, expanding the Trans Mountain pipeline (TMX) is the only major energy project to become operational under the Trudeau government. They neither initially approved TMX, and were forced to buy the pipeline outright after its original private sector owners pulled out.
The groundwork for TMX, Northern Gateway, Energy East, and Keystone XL was laid under previous governments. All were on the table when they formed a government in 2015, and just one has been completed since.
Keystone XL was killed by the Obama administration, and again by Joe Biden, but Northern Gateway and Energy East had no friends in Ottawa after 2015. Needless to say, it has been very hard for the private sector to get major projects built in this country.
Canada’s oil and gas production, which takes place almost entirely in Alberta, contributes 7 per cent to Canada’s GDP and creates $12 billion per year in government revenues. The energy industry is indispensable to economic security, the Canadian standard of living, and our exports.
For now, almost every millilitre of Canada’s oil and gas that is exported still flows south.
Without smooth transit of that energy across the border, Canada’s economy will be crippled. The lack of east-west energy infrastructure is dangerous, as exemplified by the tariff threat, and one that holds us back from greater economic independence.
If Trump ends up diluting his tariff threats into individual, boutique grievances that can be easily addressed, Canada will have dodged another economic disaster.
In the meantime, let us not fall back into complacency. Canada has the ability to be both a continental and global trading power, and a national society whose borders will be respected.
Social media posts from Donald Trump should not be the reason for all that to happen.
National Post