OTTAWA — A border summit between Stephen Harper and Barack Obama was postponed twice in the last two months because U.S. Homeland Security wanted too much information about Canadian travellers.
The Harper Conservatives bristled at the requests for additional information because they viewed them as an affront to Canadian sovereignty, sources familiar with the latest round of border talks told The Canadian Press.
The massive U.S. department created after the 9-11 attacks to protect Americans will cast a long shadow over today’s summit in Washington between Harper and Obama on crafting a North American security “perimeter.”
Despite the obstacles, Harper and Obama will formally kick off the negotiations today for a new, vaunted border framework in Washington.
“They want as much as we can give them, and we’re not going to give them as much as they want,” said Colin Robertson, the former Canadian diplomat who has been consulting with the Harper government on the issue.
Harper and Obama will try to succeed where others have failed in the last decade — balancing the security imperative of preventing another major terrorist strike against an ever-thickening border that is slowing trade and commerce.
The two leaders are expected to announce their goal is to get a deal before the end of the year.
It would formally entrench joint operations on intelligence, law enforcement and migration, while allowing the unfettered flow of goods, people and services across the 49th parallel.
This latest attempt to open the border has been fraught with behind-the-scene delays because Homeland Security has demanded detailed travel data from Canada — information about who is exiting and arriving in the country, and who is merely passing through our airspace on flights.
“Homeland Security wanted access to all migration records and a whole bunch of other stuff. We said No,” Robertson said in an interview.
“It’s been resolved sufficiently enough for us to move forward.”
Though there is much informal information-sharing between law enforcement agencies in both countries, formally entrenching it in an agreement has raised alarm bells over breaches of Canadian sovereignty.
Privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart has not been consulted on the perimeter-security initiative, said her spokeswoman Anne-Marie Hayden.
She said the office would be “watching with great interest” and will be “examining the situation thoroughly to ensure that privacy considerations are taken into account.”
The Liberals have criticized the Conservative government for holding the preliminary talks in secret when so much is at stake.
“This is becoming a stealth deal, and a bad stealth deal at that. And bad stealth deals are bad for Canadian democracy,” Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff charged Thursday in the House of Commons.
Robertson, who served in the Canadian Embassy in Washington for many years, has urged the government to seek buy-in from Ignatieff as well as the provinces.
“The Canadian debate will be noisy,” Robertson writes in a forthcoming report for the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute and the Canadian International Council.
“Concerns over privacy, standards and sovereignty need to be assuaged and the case made for how the initiative serves the national interest. Mr. Harper needs to confide in Mr. Ignatieff and the premiers.”
The government has scheduled a Friday morning briefing on their plans with key business groups.
Canadian executives have been clamouring for years for greater regulatory integration with the U.S. to remove what they see as unnecessary trade barriers.
In his report, Robertson says a deal could involve four elements:
— an initial move to increase the dollar limits on cross-border purchases, campaigns to enrol both Canadians and Americans in a trusted traveller program, and an open skies agreement;
— streamlined border measures based on pre-clearance of people and goods to eliminate border delays;
— trade policy that harmonizes regulations to facilitate the flow of people, goods and services;
— shared, binational institutions modelled on the success of the International Joint Commission, which manages common waterways, and Norad, the Canada-U.S. aerospace command for the continent.
Robertson argues this could be accomplished through a small bilateral task force including provincial representatives, with an advisory committee including business and labour, with a mandate to report progress monthly to the president and prime minister.
The goal would be an “early harvest” of initial items by July and a full draft agreement by November.
New Democrat MP Brian Masse, whose Ontario riding includes the vital Ambassador Bridge between the countries, said the Conservatives were acting like the American government’s doormat.
“American politicians continue to slag Canadians as terrorists and they go uncontested every single day. Every deal this prime minister has made has led to a thicker border, not a thinner one.”
Canadian businesses in places like Windsor, Ont., are being hit hard by increased fees and longer delays, he said. Robertson and others expect that the eventual plan would involve investments in border infrastructure, which has long been discussed as one way to ease congestion at crossings.
But Robertson said no one should expect Harper and Obama to announce concrete infrastructure projects. “They’ll talk in generalities about highways and ports and airways.”
The initiatives would build on and almost certainly accelerate plans already underway.
In October, U.S. Customs and Border Protection commissioner Alan Bersin said implementation of a northern border strategy and the development of a maritime strategy are key to continental security and safety.
He said his organization had engaged with the Canada Border Services Agency “on our vision of ’perimeter security’ on the continental scale.”
“We’ve also reached out to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to discuss ways to deepen our collaboration along the border between the ports of entry,” he told the Migration Policy Institute in Washington.
“These engagements have given rise to a series of specific bilateral initiatives, covering such disparate issues as watch listing, binational consultation on ports of entry, land cargo pre-clearance, and joint operations between the ports of entry.”
International Trade Minister Peter Van Loan said he was looking forward to Friday’s talks in Washington.
“We have a very positive relationship with the Obama administration,” Van Loan said in an interview from New York City, where he was promoting cross-border investment.
“We have the same risks in common, but we also have the same interest in keeping our economies and our trading relationship moving forward positively.”
Before the economic downturn, Van Loan said two-way trade across the border had peaked $2 billion a day, before dropping to $1.6 billion.
It’s on the way back up again. “Whether it’s infrastructure, rules, we need that border to work smoothly and to work well. That’s an interest we share in common with the United States.”