Canada takes note of a 'win-win-win' approach to NAFTA

Canada's top diplomat says she's cautiously optimistic about the United States's intentions with the North American Free Trade Agreement after hearing Vice-President Mike Pence call modernization a "win-win-win" situation.

But just days before the U.S. is expected to release its trading objectives, Freeland still won't say whether she thinks Trump is after renovations or a complete demolition of NAFTA.

• Trudeau urges governors to stand with Canada on trade

• Republican governor says NAFTA brings benefits on 'both sides of the border' 

In a speech in front of dozens of state governors, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Freeland on Friday, Pence promised a collaborative approach.

"We will modernize NAFTA for the 21st century so that it is a win-win-win for all of our trading partners in North America," Pence said. "We're looking forward to bringing NAFTA into the future in a way that will equally benefit both our countries."

"He underscored that in his bilateral meeting with us and said that was a very intentional remark. I think that's a great attitude for the United States to have going into these negotiations," Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland said in an interview with Catherine Cullen on CBC Radio's The House.

Freeland, a former journalist, was taking notes during Pence's speech and said she drew three stars beside his win-win-win comment.

"That kind of approach is really rational based on the objective reality of the relationship so I am cautiously optimistic. But, you know, trade negotiations as we know with [the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement ] even between the best of friends who have shared objectives, trade negotiations can have lots of twists and turns."

On Monday, 30 days before formal talks begin, the United States Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer's office is expected to publish his negotiating objectives, outlining the Trump administration's path going forward.

"I have some ideas of what I am looking for and I have some ideas about what I'll take as a good sign and as a less good sign but I'm not going to prejudge it until I've seen it," said Freeland.

Governors 'wield an incredible amount of power' as trade talks looms

"What we say and what we do truly, truly do matter, and we need to choose our words wisely. We don't need to threaten," Scott said.

"I think just the way he uses his words sometimes is perceived as threats."

Vermont, which shares its northern border with Quebec, look to Canada as its largest trading partner by far. In 2013, 46 per cent of Vermont's total goods was exported to Canada totalling $1.9 billion, according to the office of the U.S. trade representative.

"I think the governors wield an incredible amount of power when we work together collectively," he said. "We can be a voice for our Canadian friends to make sure that we preserve that relationship and enhance it."

"Canada is most important to us and I think most of us realize that," he said.

Softwood lumber file could be settled in a month, says N.B.

New Brunswick Premier Brian Gallant says there's a window to deal with the U.S. on the softwood lumber file in the next month, but then things could get bogged down with the NAFTA renegociations. 

• New Brunswick a stumbling block to softwood deal, says analyst
• N.B. softwood lumber duties don't come up in Maine governor's visit with Trump

"If there's no agreement on softwood lumber in the next month I think it gets complicated. This is just my hypothesis but as soon as the NAFTA discussions start up, softwood lumber will sort of get drowned out in the sea of NAFTA. So we're very aware of that. And I would be prepared to say I think all the parties involved are aware of that," he said.

"If we don't see an agreement in the next month or so it's going to mean we all should all be preparing for this to be a little drawn out. More so than we would like." 

Last month, the U.S. Commerce Department hit Canada with an additional 6.87 per cent in preliminary average anti-dumping tariffs, leaving the industry facing average duties of about 27 per cent.

The decision exempts three Atlantic provinces, but New Brunswick — exempt from such tariffs in the past — was not excluded that time around.

Softwood lumber contributes more than $1.45 billion to the New Brunswick economy each year and employs more than 22,000 people.

Gallant says he and his fellow premiers will discuss the looming NAFTA talks when they meet in Edmonton early this week.

Use of solitary confinement on trial

An unusual summer trial is underway in Vancouver where the federal government is defending its use of solitary confinement.

The British Columbia Civil Liberties Association and John Howard Society of Canada allege the government has violated the constitutional rights of prisoners through its use of prolonged and indefinite segregation. 

Nick Bullock has a unique point of view on the the issue of solitary confinement: it's through a brick-sized hole in a metal door.

• Read more of Alison Crawford's feature on solitary confinement here
• B.C. Supreme Court to test legality of Canada's solitary confinement rules

Bullock has been behind bars since he was 16.

Arrested in 2006 for stabbing his younger cousin to death and sentenced as an adult to life in prison, Bullock has bounced between medium and maximum security institutions in Ontario and B.C. before his transfer to Renous.

"We're still human beings," told the CBC's Alison Crawford over the phone from Atlantic Institution in Renous, N.B.

"Like locking anybody in a room for 23 hours a day and only giving them a shower every other day and having limited contact with people is not the correct way to go about reforming people. You're making them worse. "

Bullock said he's been in some variation of solitary confinement for 11 months and through transfers from Ontario to B.C. and then on March 1 to New Brunswick.

"I think it has something to do with while at [the Kent Institution in B.C.] one of the correctional managers made a statement that I said something about my life being in danger, which is absolutely not true," he explained.

The isolation, he said is getting to him, especially after the death in April, of another offender on his range.

Guy Langlois hanged himself after 118 days in solitary and on the day the 38-year-old Métis man was due to be transferred to the Kent Institution in Agassiz, B.C.

"The prolonged segregation of people with mental health disorders, like whatever they are, be it depression, anxiety, schizophrenia," said Bullock.

"I think that's their first go-to, is segregation."

Bullock's points are among many arguments being presented at the B.C. Supreme Court in a nine-week trial.

"These cells, in addition to being so small, in some instances no wider than an adult male arm span," Paterson began, "are filthy, have walls covered in feces and mucous and food and other bodily fluids. They're not cleaned, with poor air quality," said BCCLA executive director Josh Paterson.

"We know from the federal government's own statistics that Indigenous inmates are more likely to be placed in solitary confinement. And when they're in there, they stay there for longer than others."