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Canada Appears to Cave to U.S. Conditions to Join TPP Talks

Yesterday I posted a series of questions regarding Canada’s entry into the Trans Pacific Partnership talks with the focus on whether the Canadian government caved to U.S. conditions that Canada will not be able to reopen any chapters where agreement has already been reached among the current nine TPP partners and that it would not have “veto authority” over any chapter.  Prime Minister Stephen Harper was asked about the conditions at his press conference and after stating that there were no substantive pre-conditions (at 5:10), admitted that “we have agreed…there is an accession process so we don’t disrupt the negotiations…we’re not going to try to undo what’s been done.” In other words, the conditions of entry are now described as an accession process that binds Canada to the already agreed-upon terms of the agreement.

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8 Comments

  1. Surprised?
    I am not surprised about this… For Harper, if US corporations say “Jump” Harper will start jumping and wont stop until they tell him to stop.

  2. TPP
    Is this TPP a guarantee to go through is there no process, a vote or going through congress or something?

  3. Ray Saintonge says:

    If Canada’s and Mexico’s admission to the process requires legislative approval in 9 countries this could lead to some interesting discussions in the US Congress where there are frequent concerns about any usurpation of power by the eecutive branch.

  4. ?
    When does this TPP go into effect? Harper knew he had to get C-11 passed quickly just because of TPP and once it does go into effect I don’t see a need for any other copyright bills in the US because they would of won with this.

  5. Canada needs to observe intellectual property rules the same way other TPP-potentials do, like Taiwan, Mexico, Vietnam, and the Philippines.

  6. Sean Flynn says:

    IP is not closed
    The agreement to not disrupt closed chapters likely means nothing on IP. The IP issues are still very much under negotiation, so another of Michael’s question’s is still very much applicable — will Canada agree to re-write its new (and in some cases, best practice) copyright act to accept US demands?

  7. Hopefully not.

    The paranoid in me, however, has a different prediction in mind.

  8. Someone mentioned on the news….
    That this could put an end to dairy quotas and we’ll see cheese and milk prices plummet?