SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 186 - Apr/27/23

Apr/27/23 5:13:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this is another example of an announcement, a reannouncement and a rollout that takes forever, which is then fraught with bureaucracy or is not applicable to a lot of people. I have memories from during the pandemic when some of the programs people could apply for could only be accessed through the major banks. If people dealt with a credit union, they were not allowed to apply, and a lot of people deal with credit unions across the country. This is another example of the government not thinking its programs through. They will not work for most people.

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Mr. Gabriel Ste-Marie (Joliette, BQ)

Apr/27/23 5:13:56 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-47

Madam Speaker, regional flights are very expensive and with the increase in the cost of fuel, ticket prices have continued to increase over the past few years. Instead of proposing measures to make regional flights more affordable, Bill C‑47 is making them more expensive with a significant increase in the air travellers security tax for both international and regional flights. Prices will therefore increase. What does my hon. colleague think about that? Would it not make sense to at least exempt regional flights from the tax increase?

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Mrs. Tracy Gray

Apr/27/23 5:14:36 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the whole air transport system is a colossal mess, and when we look at what has happened, we see it is because of the government. We have seen lineups at airports beyond compare. We have seen that people are unable to get their passports, and the minister responsible for passports is now saying that people should not even bother applying. Everything the government touches is a mess and is broken. When it takes anything on, it has shown it really cannot govern and cannot operate. Anything it touches, it seems to break.

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Mr. Alistair MacGregor (Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, NDP)

Apr/27/23 5:15:28 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, yes, certain federal services are going to be disrupted. That is the nature of a strike as workers fight for better wages. I have a question for my Conservative colleague because we have not yet heard from them on this. As they like to stand with workers, would they stand with these workers, who are some of the lowest-paid civil servants we have, as they fight for wages that keep pace with inflation?

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Mrs. Tracy Gray

Apr/27/23 5:15:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, a lot of what I was talking about earlier had to do with services over the last several years, where we saw an immigration backlog of over a million people, veterans waiting four years for disability insurance, and of course the whole passport fiasco. All of that has existed over the last so many years, and this is at a time when the government has increased the bureaucracy, doubled the cost of the bureaucracy, and spent billions of dollars on consultants, yet we have fewer services.

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Mrs. Shannon Stubbs (Lakeland, CPC)

Apr/27/23 5:16:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, for eight years, Conservatives warned that the cost of this NDP-Liberal government would fuel inflation, hike interest rates and drive up the cost of living for all Canadians. The Liberals are spending more than ever before, while everyday Canadians are struggling more than ever before. That is the consequence of the costly coalition’s agenda to tax and spend recklessly. Budget 2023’s $70 billion in new spending will have to be covered by $4,300 from every Canadian family in the taxes they pay. Since 2019 alone, the Liberals have increased spending by $120 billion, and most of it was not related to COVID. The Liberal deficit is now over $40 billion a year, and the debt will hit $1.3 trillion in only five years from now. This Prime Minister has added more debt than every other prime minister before combined. His own finance minister confirms that debt interest has increased 80% in the last three years. That is $43.9 billion a year, or 10% of all government spending. These are shocking numbers that are hard to conceive of. In reality, they mean that, if a Canadian paid taxes this year, they paid $1,400 dollars just to service the Liberals’ debt, not even to pay it down. So much for the Prime Minister’s 2015 promise of three years of $10-billion annual deficits. What the Liberals have done is exactly what Conservatives warned about. This budget will up the debt, up how much Canadians pay for it and up the cost of everything in daily life. This is all while Liberals drive away private sector investment, businesses and jobs in key sectors, such as natural resources, which make outsized investments and pay outsized taxes compared to all other sectors for the public services and programs that Canadians' value. Liberal meddling makes life more expensive for people in Lakeland and across Canada. The January 2023 Liberal tax hikes already cost Canadians over $300 more this year, when half of Canadians are already $200 away from bankruptcy. The Liberal carbon tax will cost Canadians in Lakeland nearly $3,000 dollars a year only seven years from now, and it will immediately take another $700, which they do not have, from them this year alone. While the Liberals may claim otherwise, the independent PBO is clear that their carbon tax increases the cost of literally everything, which is why Canadians pay more than they will ever get back from these Liberals. Across all provinces where the Liberals have imposed their carbon tax, four in five Canadians will pay more than they get back, which is the truth, while nearly half of Canadians are forced to borrow for basics and have no emergency savings. More than ever before, 1.5 million Canadians have to go to food banks to make ends meet, and 69% of seniors have to work longer than planned now because NDP-Liberal spending-driven inflation has killed the purchasing power of their retirement savings. What is the Liberals’ response? It is to increase taxes and increase spending to wipe out any savings Canadians have been able to keep, and then have the gall to ask struggling Canadians to be grateful when the few who meet complicated criteria get a one-off cheque for a couple hundred dollars in the mail, which does not come close to covering the costs most Canadians face because of these Liberals. They are so out of touch, and Canadians are out of money. The truth is that lower taxes and attractive business conditions always result in more revenue for governments. The Liberals do this backwards. Under the former Conservative government, foreign investment averaged $55.6 billion annually in Canada while major projects flourished. Under these Liberals, there has been a big drop to $39 billion a year. There are big problems with the Liberals’ plans for natural resources in budget 2023. The Liberals should not aim to match the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act’s $394 billion in subsidies, which is more than Canada’s total annual revenue. The Liberals did try, with billions in badly targeted subsidies, but the tax credit incentives will not actually incentivize and expand energy transformation in Canada as well as they could, and I will explain why. The U.S. IRA has technology-neutral production tax credits for low-emissions electricity or parts manufacturing, which means established and multipronged, profitable energy companies can keep investing in these technologies. However, in Canada, the Liberals cut out every oil and gas company from eligibility for the clean technology investment tax credit, the very companies who currently fund 75% of Canadian clean tech investment in this country overall. The Liberals' tax credit encourages them to put those investments in the U.S. and other countries, where it would be welcomed and rewarded. Meanwhile, labour conditions on the Liberals’ tax credits, which will infringe on negotiated agreements, are likely to harm exclusive solar and wind companies’ ability to access the credits since their workers are often unskilled labourers and the companies just cannot meet the Liberals' targets. The Liberals obviously make bad investments with tax dollars, with a third of the budget, $35 billion, now being sent to the Canada growth fund. Canadians probably remember the very expensive $35-billion Canada Infrastructure Bank, which has not actually built a single thing after eight years. It is so bad that Parliament’s transport committee even says it should be abolished. Now the Liberals are putting billions into the Canada growth fund, run by the board which, as alleged by Hong Kong Watch late last year, invested Canadians’ pension funds in companies helping the Communist Party’s Uyghur labour camps. Liberals pick a couple of winners and make lots of losers when they put Canadian tax dollars into big government slush funds, where they seem to disappear and do not actually benefit Canadians. Conservatives have a better idea. It is to cut taxes and scrap the anti-energy, anti-private sector agenda that drives money and businesses away, so Canada can be a world leader in energy and environment technology development and exports without a single taxpayer dime, instead of pumping billions into broken programs and ineffective, poorly targeted tax incentives. Under Conservatives, the private sector built three pipelines and reversed a fourth for western oil to feed eastern Canadian refineries, as well as attracted proposals for export pipelines in both directions. In contrast, after eight years, the Liberals have killed five pipelines that would have increased Canadian export capacity, and then they even bought TMX because they refused to give the legal and political certainty for the proponent to get it built after approval. In the least surprising, and most brutal, news ever, its cost has ballooned over 350%, from $6.8 billion in the private sector to $30.9 billion today. It should have been in service four years ago, and it is not even built. The whole NDP-Liberal agenda is designed to hinder Canadian oil and gas, the leading export and private sector investor in the economy, but they are just fine with oil imported from the U.S. and from regimes with lower environmental and human rights standards, while landlocking Canadian resources and innovation, and gatekeeping our ability to help lower emissions globally. Instead of attracting foreign investment to Canada, Liberals choose to pay tens of billions of tax dollars to major foreign companies just to get them to do business here. Canada used to have competitive advantages to attract investment, but instead, in a recent announcement, the Liberals are paying $4.3 million tax dollars per job to get a company to expand. That is because they have added layers of new red tape and taxes that drive away the private sector investment and tax revenue that comes from these projects, while they made government less efficient. Maybe the worst part is that their anti-energy policies do not even do what they claim. Their record on emissions reduction is that, after eight years, every year emissions have increased, except for one year, which was 2020, when governments locked Canadians down. They also promised to plant two billion trees, but the Auditor General says they will not even get 4% of that done by the 2030 deadline. They cannot even claim to know their policies work because the Auditor General also said, “Environment and Climate Change Canada did not measure or report on the contributions of each selected greenhouse gas regulation”, but the Liberals are doubling down with their fuel regulations, a second carbon tax that will cost Canadians another $1,300 dollars more a year and a 13¢-a-litre increase to gas. Their own research shows it would “increase energy prices” and “disproportionately affect lower- and middle-income households”, as we have always warned. The Liberals plan more mandates, more standards and more regulations to come, which will hike costs for everyday Canadians and businesses. On top of imposing these extra costs, which producers in competing countries do not face, their permitting system for natural resource development is broken. Canada is second last in OECD countries and 64th in the world for building permits. The Liberals are talking a big game about critical minerals around the world, but it takes 30 years, and they have made no changes. They talk about sending out LNG, but they have allowed 18 proposals under their watch to be abandoned, and they leave Canada behind. It is a travesty. Conservatives would cut taxes, cut red tape, reward people who are hard working and unleash Canadian private sector investment and innovation to help lower global emissions and get our economy back on track while protecting taxpayers.

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Mr. Mark Gerretsen (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons (Senate), Lib.)

Apr/27/23 5:26:41 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member brought up the carbon tax on a number of occasions. I will say one thing, which is that we are consistent on this side. We ran on it in 2015. We implemented it. We continue to stand by it because we know and believe that it has been widely recognized throughout the world as a solution to combatting the emissions out there. However, we cannot say the same thing about Conservatives, because they seem to flip-flop back and forth as to how they feel about a price on pollution. Can the member comment on what it was like in 2021 when she was going around knocking on doors and selling people on the price on pollution, which her leader, the member for Durham, was advocating at the time? Perhaps she did not agree with it, but can she tell us—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Apr/27/23 5:27:46 p.m.
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The hon. member for Lakeland.

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Lakeland

Mrs. Shannon Stubbs

Apr/27/23 5:27:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my team and I did knock on 10,000 doors in Lakeland over the course of the campaign. I can just confirm that I never sold that plan, and Conservatives have resolved this issue. We will axe the carbon tax. I would like to talk about the initiatives that Canada can offer the world to help lower global emissions, which is the goal that the member says he wants to achieve with his carbon tax but clearly cannot. Let me go back to the issue around critical minerals. Fewer than half of the mining applications in the last eight years have actually gone ahead under the Liberals. Canada has a huge opportunity to produce critical minerals and rare earth metals for our own self-sufficiency and secure development of the fuels of the future, and to export them. However, the Liberals' red tape keeps the minerals in the ground, while competitors and hostile regimes dominate globally. That is the exact same thing that is happening with LNG. When our allies are begging for Canadian LNG, these guys stand in the way.

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Mr. René Villemure (Trois-Rivières, BQ)

Apr/27/23 5:28:44 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Lakeland for her speech. What stands out for me is that she presented a vision that is very typical of the Conservative Party, and that is to cut taxes and keep cutting them. I wonder if the only way to act in the public interest will always be to cut everything or to spend everything.

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Mrs. Shannon Stubbs

Apr/27/23 5:29:18 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate the question because it reveals just how backward this is and what a mess the Liberals have made. Lower taxes and attractive business tools that attract private sector investment always actually result in a government's gaining higher tax levels, more taxes and more revenue that they can then put into the programs and services that Canadians value. The course that the Liberals are sending this country on is a betrayal of all future generations. It is an absolute catastrophe for the competitiveness and economic opportunities of our country while Canadians are struggling more than ever before. The government has to put needs before wants and establish clear priorities. It does not have a revenue problem. It does have a spending problem. It needs to cut taxes and red tape to make sure the economy can keep—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Apr/27/23 5:30:14 p.m.
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I have to interrupt the hon. member, who will have a minute and a half after Private Members' Business to conclude with questions and comments.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Apr/27/23 5:30:47 p.m.
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There being no motion at report stage, the House will now proceed, without debate, to the putting of the question on the motion to concur in the bill at report stage.

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Proceed

Mr. Jeremy Patzer (Cypress Hills—Grasslands, CPC)

Apr/27/23 5:31:07 p.m.
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moved that the bill, as amended, be concurred in.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Apr/27/23 5:31:22 p.m.
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If a member of a recognized party present in the House wishes that the motion be carried or carried on division or wishes to request a recorded division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.

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Mr. Jeremy Patzer

Apr/27/23 5:32:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I request that it be carried on division.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Apr/27/23 5:32:07 p.m.
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Is that agreed? Some hon. members: Agreed. The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès): When shall the bill be read a third time? By leave, now? Some hon. members: Agreed.

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Deputy
Shall

Mr. Jeremy Patzer

Apr/27/23 5:32:36 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-294

moved that the bill be read the third time and passed. He said: Madam Speaker, it is an honour to once again be able to rise in this place and speak to my private member's bill, Bill C-294. This time, it has reached a new stage, at third reading, in the House of Commons. It is also important to acknowledge many of our fellow Canadians who are listening and who have been following this bill's progress for a while now. They are watching and waiting for the necessary change that it would bring. So far, the process of reviewing Bill C-294 has been moving along at a steady pace. It might not happen very often, but when we voted on it, this bill passed through the House of Commons at second reading with unanimous support. That was an encouraging thing to see and I remain hopeful that it can happen once again as we go through third reading and debate in the House again. Now that the committee has finished its study and the bill passed through the committee unanimously as well, I am eager to, hopefully, vote and pass this as quickly as we possibly can. There are many communities in my riding of Cypress Hills—Grasslands, in my province of Saskatchewan and all throughout this country who are counting on this bill's passing. The sooner we can help them, the better. That is what got this whole thing started in the first place. In my first speech with respect to Bill C-294, I told the story of Honey Bee Manufacturing, which is based in my riding, because its owners are the ones who brought this issue of interoperability to my attention. It is one success story among many for small businesses in Canada and it should be allowed to continue doing what it does best. However, it is the company's larger impact on the survival of local communities in the surrounding area that really brings it home for me, so when we had witnesses appear for the committee study, it felt like I had some déjà vu, because some people from Honey Bee came all the way out to Ottawa just to be part of the panel. About three years earlier, they had done the exact same thing when I was a member of the industry committee and we were studying the CUSMA deal. That is when they started to raise the issue of interoperability under the Canadian Copyright Act. The same effort to make sure that Canadian innovators and communities can thrive has been going strong ever since. Once again, during their most recent appearance, they were the best advocates for the issue because of their unique position on the front lines as the people who are the boots on the ground working on these issues each and every day. I am going to quote from a large portion of their statement to the committee, because they can speak to their own situation better than anyone else can. I quote: We are a global company, from the people we work with to the 29 countries we export to. Honey Bee sells 50% of its product in North America and exports the remainder to the rest of the world. However, our industry is still placed on an uneven playing field versus our U.S. counterparts. Foreign platforms seek to prevent participation by Canadian brands. Honey Bee's opportunity to capitalize on intellectual property is based on our ability to interoperate with OEM equipment platforms. Interoperability means that a Honey Bee harvest header can “plug and play” with OEM equipment. Historically, this has been provided in a straightforward and obvious way, like the way a keyboard plugs into a computer. Today, Canadian industry is technically blocked by some dominant international brands, with the impact being a loss of substantial market participation opportunity. The net result is “authorized use only”. This is controlled by OEM digital locks and keys that are unavailable to manufacturers of implement. Instead of spending our research budget on innovation, we are burning it on adaptation. It is important to state that in no way should Canadian manufacturers, dealers and—most importantly—farmer customers be at a disadvantage on choice. Historically, we had an integrated farm equipment market in North America and abroad. Honey Bee innovation caters to the specific needs of many markets and considers their unique environments, practices and crops. Meeting these challenges brings Canadian innovation to the world. The impact of technical lockout by OEMs will be the collapse of our Canadian implement manufacturing industry, which will decimate many of our smaller communities. Throughout the different stages of Bill C-294, I have talked a lot about Honey Bee specifically. It is a good example of short-line manufacturing in particular, but it is always important to emphasize that the issue of interoperability is something much larger and more significant than a single business or any one single type of product. In their presentation, the people from Honey Bee made a point of passing on support for the Agricultural Manufacturers of Canada and the North American Equipment Dealers Association, whose representatives were unable to attend the proceedings on that particular day. They mentioned that those two industry associations represent 240 members and 4,000 members, respectively. In addition, the committee heard directly from other witnesses who were present. Along with members of the Canada West Foundation, there were various stakeholders and experts who specialize in copyright or related areas of public policy. Overall, it is fair to say that the testimony provided to the committee was overwhelmingly supportive of Bill C-294 and what it is aiming to do. For the benefit of my colleagues who were not at the committee meetings but are participating in this debate tonight, I will try to quickly provide some highlights from the study. One of the witnesses, Anthony Rosborough, is a lawyer with relevant expertise. He explained part of the issue this way: In the world of embedded computer systems and the Internet of things, interoperability is synonymous with innovation. Bill C-294 reflects this reality, and it reflects the needs of Canadian innovators by not allowing manufacturers to prevent competition in secondary markets under the auspices of copyright. In another part of his opening statement, he added: This bill takes the right approach by broadening the application of the interoperability exception to include not only computer programs but also devices in which they are embedded. This is crucial, because the distinction between the computer program and the computing hardware is much less clear than it once was. In the past, it may have been easier to distinguish between hardware and software, but when software now controls the physical functioning of devices and components, the software and hardware blend together. As I wrote in my 2021 article, the Copyright Act’s conceptualization of interoperability needs to reflect today's computing and innovation paradigm. Computers are no longer just boxes with screens and keyboards. They are cars, home appliances, pacemakers, agricultural equipment and learning technologies. With the rapid pace of changing technology, it is no surprise we need to update the Copyright Act after its most recent update over 10 years ago. The focus of Bill C-294 is to update our legal enforcement of TPMs so they are not misused to stifle creativity and innovation. That was never their original intention, and we have to make sure our law is applied fairly and with common sense. Over the last decade, the use of digital locks has been spreading far beyond the simple protection of creative works. Dr. Alissa Centivany, who works as a professor and researcher, provided more detail and context about TPMs. In her opening remarks, she said: TPMs were originally intended to create artificial digital scarcity so that creators of creative and artistic works who feared that the burgeoning Internet would lead to unfettered infringement on their works online wouldn't lose all incentive to create. Times have changed. We can now see that TPMs overshot their original mark. Today TPMs are used to restrict a wide range of lawful non-infringing activities that bear no relationship to protected works at all. By being keyed to access rather than infringement, TPMs have been a disaster for consumers.... TPMs lock consumers and third parties out. They also lock us in to ongoing relationships with companies and service providers whether we like it or not. We live in walled gardens, platform bubbles and tech silos—disconnected, closed worlds—and we are largely stuck because restrictions on interoperability have enabled switching costs to rise to untenable levels. We lack the economic agency to leave for an alternative or substitute provider. No matter how nice the trappings might appear at times, a cage is still a cage. On a similar point, a witness for the Public Interest Advocacy Centre added: In order to achieve improved access to compatible goods, competing companies must be able to examine each other's software for the purpose of developing interoperable products. Currently, manufacturers use TPMs to deny competitors access to the information, preferring instead to make goods that can only be used in conjunction with other products that they manufacture in a closed loop that encourages anti-competitive lock-in. It was good for us to hear some of the academic input in committee. It helped us to step back and hear about the issue in a way that shows how broad and far-reaching it can be. While most people do not think of interoperability very often, if they ever do at all, it is still an issue that affects us as consumers or as businesses in a competitive marketplace. This issue has so many aspects and we only have a limited amount of time for debate. There were some points of disagreement between different witnesses, although there seemed to be almost consensus that Bill C-294 is going in the right direction and would improve an outdated version of the Copyright Act. It reaffirmed the all-party support that this bill received at second reading. We are moving forward with the same principles that the Copyright Act has always maintained. This bill is not doing something new. It is only responding to recent changes in the marketplace that have caused innovators and consumers to lose ground they once had. All we are trying to do is get back to the right balance, which we had before. Interoperability has existed all along and was taken for granted. It is an essential part of our economy that we cannot afford to lose. Bill C-294 has a simple solution. We would have a limited exemption for interoperability with clear and meaningful language that is currently lacking. Something else that should be discussed at this stage is the amendment that was made to the bill at committee. The original draft that I introduced had a separate section with specific language about manufacturers. With the example of Honey Bee and similar businesses out there, it is absolutely necessary for the legislation to protect what they are doing. At the same time, I have acknowledged from the start that our approach to copyright has to be compliant with our trade agreements. The additions to the bill have taken a careful look at our agreements and have expanded the scope of the bill in some ways. That is what we are trying to do by using newer language about “lawfully obtained computer programs”, instead of specifically mentioning manufacturers. To be clear, the intent of this bill remains exactly the same as it was in the first version. We want to guarantee manufacturers the right to circumvent TPMs for the purpose of interoperability. That is non-negotiable. For my part, I agreed to accept this amendment from the government on the understanding that this would be the case. I have been assured that this is what the bill’s language would do in practice if it is, hopefully, passed. Along with the need to use technical language that is in harmony with our trade agreements, I want to reassure my colleagues across the House once again about our relationship with our trading partners, especially the United States. For the agricultural sector, we are seeking an exemption for interoperability that is equivalent to what already exists south of the border. Their system for regulating copyright is quite different from ours in practice, but this bill is trying to accomplish the same goal, mainly for our farm equipment, but also across other parts of the economy. We did hear some testimony at committee about the potential benefits of imitating the U.S.'s regulatory approach, and that could be a conversation worth having. That will have to be on another day. It is not the intent of this particular bill. What we wanted to deal with is what is not happening in Canada, and we need to catch up. Sometimes we have to move faster than the speed of bureaucracy, which is why we are taking this legislative approach. As it stands, our consideration of Bill C-294 has helped to show how we might want to improve the Copyright Act in other ways, such as by having a more flexible approach that can be accomplished through regulation, but that is a much larger issue than is typical or realistic for a private member’s bill. I will leave that to the government side to figure out, and I hope the work we have all done together on Bill C-294 will help that out. I have a lot of hope that we can move forward with this bill and see it quickly pass this House and move on to the other place, where hopefully it can receive royal assent.

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Mr. Daniel Blaikie (Elmwood—Transcona, NDP)

Apr/27/23 5:45:35 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I just want to circle back to some of the member's reflections on the Canada-U.S.-Mexico trade agreement, which I know Conservatives were concerned to see pass very quickly. Of course, this was one of those extant issues. I am wondering if he could speak a bit to how he thinks our trade partners might respond to something like this and what the consequences could be. We know we are under some other trade agreements. Of course, CUSMA does not have the same investor-state dispute settlement provisions as NAFTA did, but I wonder if he is aware of what some of the risks are in terms of other parties. There is a nation-to-nation dispute mechanism in CUSMA, for instance. How might that be received, and what kinds of risks might Canada have to consider in moving ahead with something that makes a lot of sense for people in the Canadian economy, who should have the right to repair their own equipment?

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Mr. Jeremy Patzer

Apr/27/23 5:46:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think the important part is that we are not trying to go above and beyond what the Americans already have. They have kind of set the standard right now around the world for how interoperability can be achieved. As I said, their mechanism is different, but what we are trying to do is only come up to and match what they already have, so that way we are not setting a new precedent. Hopefully one day the government can do that, but right now we are just trying to match what they already have. Within CUSMA, we heard both from the department officials and from some of the other witnesses that there is a legislative process that does allow us to expand the scope of TPMs or the ability to circumvent TPMs without being in circumvention of CUSMA. We also looked at how this bill could impact some of the other trade deals we are already in with other countries and also the future deals we might be signing. As of right now, there are no negative implications for any of our trade deals. This does fit within that narrative, and we should be okay.

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