Submission to the Government of Canada Consultation on the Review of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) from the Trade Justice Network

Thank you for this opportunity to provide the Trade Justice Network’s recommendations in advance of the review of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement. The Trade Justice Network (TJN) is a coalition of labour, environmental, and social justice organizations. Our members include the Canadian Labour Congress, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, the National Union of Public and General Employees, the Public Service Alliance of Canada, Unifor, and the United Steelworkers. In total, our coalition represents well over three million working people.

When public consultations were held last year, it was business that overwhelmingly made submissions. Here is the breakdown:

Industry/business associations (109) Provinces/Territories (8) Civil Society Organizations (CSOs), labour, and Indigenous groups (13) Academia and individuals (7)

As you can see we need more First Nations, unions and civil society to make their voices heard, especially given the challenges we face in these uncertain times.

Please take the time to make a submission through this page that will be automatically delivered the the government’s consultation email. Submissions are accepted until Monday November 3, 2025.

APEP was first announced in June 2022 by US President Biden, and its broad objectives were agreed to in January 2023 in the Joint Declaration on APEP. This meeting also agreed on APEP’s four main “pillars”:

1. regional competitiveness,
2. resilient supply chains,
3. shared prosperity, and
4. sustainable investment.

Notably, APEP has no new trade liberalization (tariff reductions and market access).

This new approach comes as governments around the world are starting to recognize what activists have said for decades: the status quo in the global economy is failing. For almost 30 years, Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) have consistently put corporate profits before workers’ wages, have put investor rights before environmental protections, and have facilitated privatization and exploitative wage and regulatory arbitrage. The result has been obscene wealth inequality, rapid climate change, and dysfunctional democracies.