{"id":156365,"date":"2018-03-13T05:44:24","date_gmt":"2018-03-13T09:44:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=156365"},"modified":"2018-03-13T05:44:24","modified_gmt":"2018-03-13T09:44:24","slug":"we-had-your-backs-trudeau-on-countrys-steel-and-aluminum-workers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/03\/13\/we-had-your-backs-trudeau-on-countrys-steel-and-aluminum-workers\/","title":{"rendered":"‘We had your backs’: Trudeau on country’s steel and aluminum workers"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\u201cI<\/a>
\u201cI told the president that imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum does not help with regard to NAFTA,\u201d Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Monday. \u201cIt has a negative impact on the NAFTA talks. \u201cTo impose tariffs that would hurt workers on both sides of the border – it’s not like that that we’ll negotiate a better NAFTA deal.\u201d
(Shutterstock)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

MONTREAL – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he told U.S. President Donald Trump during a recent phone call that slapping duties on Canadian steel and aluminum would hurt ongoing NAFTA negotiations.<\/p>\n

\u201cI told the president that imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum does not help with regard to NAFTA,\u201d Trudeau said Monday. \u201cIt has a negative impact on the NAFTA talks.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo impose tariffs that would hurt workers on both sides of the border – it’s not like that that we’ll negotiate a better NAFTA deal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trudeau also said it was in part due to the hard work of Canadian officials that Trump exempted\u00a0Canada\u00a0from the tariffs last week.<\/p>\n

\u201cMake no mistake – this was a true Team\u00a0Canada\u00a0effort and it will continue to be, moving forward,\u201d he told a news conference at the Rio Tinto Alcan aluminum plant in Saguenay, about 250 kilometres north of Quebec City.<\/p>\n

The prime minister is on a cross-country tour of aluminum and steel factories to demonstrate his government’s support for workers in light of potential threats to those industries from the U.S. administration.<\/p>\n

Other stops will include Hamilton, Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., and Regina.<\/p>\n

Asked what he would do if Trump changed course and slapped duties on\u00a0Canada, Trudeau said, \u201cwe’ll see when we get to that point.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I accept what the president said,\u201d Trudeau added, \u201cthat as long as there is a free-trade deal in North America there won’t be tariffs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump said he would temporarily exempt\u00a0Canada\u00a0and Mexico from global steel and aluminium tariffs while the three countries negotiate a new NAFTA deal.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe exemption represented a positive step in the right direction but we still have a lot more work to do,\u201d Trudeau told the room full of aluminum workers. \u201cWe had your backs last week and we always will.\u201d<\/p>\n

Canada\u00a0is the United States’ largest foreign provider of steel and aluminum, with about 85 per cent of Canadian exports being directed to that country.<\/p>\n

Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard spoke to reporters alongside Trudeau and said he wouldn’t accept any undue pressure on the province’s dairy farmers as a potential compromise in the steel and aluminum conflict.<\/p>\n

Trump and his trade officials have signalled in the past they are looking for more access to\u00a0Canada’s dairy market within a renegotiated NAFTA deal.<\/p>\n

Quebec has a supply management system regarding dairy, poultry and eggs, which imposes steep tariffs on those products entering the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn our end we are going to vigorously defend supply management,\u201d Couillard said, adding Quebec’s farmers have already given up market share for other recently negotiated trade deals.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MONTREAL – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he told U.S. President Donald Trump during a recent phone call that slapping …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":141595,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[48159,22540,11237,15082],"class_list":["post-156365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","tag-global-steel-and-aluminium-tariffs","tag-nafta-negotiations","tag-prime-minister-justin-trudeau","tag-u-s-president-donald-trump","mauthors-giuseppe-valiante","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/141595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}