TILMA

[Dec 19, 2006 02:48 PM]

The premiers of Alberta and British Columbia have signed a Trade, Investment and Labour Mobility Agreement (TILMA)--and Saskatchewan is next on the western provinces' list to sign.

However, it is the position of the Canadian Union of Public Employees that TILMA is not a positive step for labour rights. While CUPE - Saskatchewan ackowledges the value of a new program that would allow trade certificates to be transferrable between the province, the organization feels that, as a whole, TILMA would dilute the legislative powers of our elected officials, and benefit large businesses at the expense of the worker and small business owner.

TILMA mandates the creation of a third-party, bureaucratic board to regulate and resolve trade disputes. The draft agreement, as Alberta and B.C. have already signed, gives extensive new ground to the private sector to sue local governments for trade infractions, such as unfavourable zoning or stringent construction regulations.

Neither the Alberta or B.C. legislatures, or municipalities from those provinces, were consulted before TILMA was signed. Saskatchewan Premier Lorne Calvert has said that his government wouldn't sign anything that resticts local governments' legislative powers.

However, also without the public consultations that have been requested, Calvert's Minister of Government Relations, Harry Van Mulligen, has said that a desision on TILMA may be handed down as early as the first weeks of the new year.

Read TILMA.

Read "Ralph's Last Laugh," a Briarpatch Magazine Article on TILMA.

Read CUPE B.C.'s stand, opposing it's province's participation in the trade-deal.