Retaliatory tariff turnaround puts Ottawa in better negotiating spot: LeBlanc
Global News
Canada drops select retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods, aiming to align with CUSMA exemptions and improve conditions ahead of upcoming continental trade talks.
Canada-U.S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc said the decision to drop retaliatory tariffs puts Ottawa in a better position to negotiate changes to U.S. President Donald Trump’s devastating duties on key sectors and eases tensions ahead of a review of a critical continental trade agreement.
“Our responsibility as the government is to get the best deal we can for Canadian businesses and Canadian workers,” LeBlanc told The Canadian Press in an interview from Moncton, N.B. “We have to be prepared to sit constructively at a table with the other side of the table and have that conversation.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney announced Friday that Canada will drop some retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products to match American tariff exemptions for goods covered under the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement on trade, called CUSMA.
Canada’s counter-tariffs on steel, aluminum and automobiles will remain.
The prime minister spoke to Trump by phone on Thursday and Carney said the president assured him the move would help kick-start trade negotiations.
LeBlanc had been cycling through Washington in July looking for a tariff off-ramp before Trump’s Aug. 1 deadline to make trade deals. LeBlanc said Canada’s retaliatory tariffs were a “significant point of contention” for the Trump administration.
A deal never materialized and Trump increased tariffs on Canadian goods to 35 per cent, with the White House pointing to the flow of fentanyl and retaliatory tariffs as the reasoning behind the boosted levies. Those duties are not applied to goods compliant under CUSMA.
Canadian officials have said that key exemption puts Canada in a better position than most countries, including nations that made a deal with the Trump administration. Trump’s separate tariffs on steel, aluminum, automobiles and copper, however, are hammering Canadian industries.
The agency says more than 22,000 people have been removed from the country in the last 12 months, and nearly 30,000 removals were "in progress" as of Oct. 31.
A problem with the signalling system caused a service interruption this morning on Montreal's light-rail network.
An Ontario lawyer accused by American authorities of advising a Canadian Olympian-turned-alleged-cocaine kingpin has had his licence to practice law suspended.
The FIFA draw ceremony will mark the first time Prime Minister Mark Carney, U.S. President Donald Trump and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum will be in the same room.
A new report finds anglophones face higher unemployment and lower wages in Quebec; gaps that researchers say carry major economic consequences.
Critics are questioning the solidity of Saab's pitch to deliver 10,000 jobs in Canada if it decides to set up shop here to assemble Gripen fighter jets.
The girl’s disappearance underscores long-standing concerns about the ease with which a parent can take a child to another country without the other parent’s knowledge or consent.
Asbestos cleanup, tight work windows and other TTC delays have slowed the build out of 5G cellular service in Toronto's subway system.
Alberta's UCP government is changing the rules to make it easier for citizens to force a referendum on issues such as the prospect of the province leaving Confederation.
An at-home DNA test given as a birthday gift solved an 80-year family mystery by revealing that a man in Quebec and a man in the Netherlands were long-lost brothers.
Lina Vargas was on the board for almost two years and told Global News that accountability and transparency are fundamental rights for all community members.
Industry Minister Melanie Joly told the House of Commons committee on international trade the move breaches federal contracts tied to manufacturing in Brampton and Windsor, Ont.
A targeted home invasion and kidnapping led to a gunpoint standoff with police and an overnight chase across Toronto. Two suspects remain at large, investigators say.