Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America

The Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America is a region-level dialogue with the stated purpose of providing greater cooperation on security and economic issues.¹ The Partnership was founded in Waco, Texas on March 23, 2005 by Paul Martin, Prime Minister of Canada, Vicente Fox, President of Mexico, and George W. Bush, President of the United States.¹

Organization

The initial SPP Working Groups are the Manufacture Goods and Sectoral and Regional Competitiveness Working Group, E-Commerce & ICT Working Group, Energy Working Group, Transportation Working Group, Food & Agriculture Working Group, Environment Working Group, Financial Services Working Group, Business Facilitation Working Group, Movement of Goods Working Group, Health, and Immigration. (Immigration is not currently listed as a working group on the SPP website.) ²

These working groups are tasked with implementing the SPP as initiated by the North American Heads of State and of Government on March 23, 2005. They consult with stakeholders; set specific, measurable, and achievable goals and implementation dates; and issue semi-annual progress reports. A 24-month agenda is established to serve as a timeline milestone to have the initial framework fully developed.

Goals

The stated goals of the SPP are cooperation and information sharing, improving productivity, reducing the costs of trade, enhancing the joint stewardship of the environment, facilitating agricultural trade while creating a safer and more reliable food supply, and protecting people from disease.

The SPP is based on the belief that prosperity is dependent on security, and claims that the three nations are bound by a shared belief in freedom, economic opportunity, and strong democratic institutions. It is intended to assist, rather than replace, existing bilateral and trilateral institutions like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and claims to work towards the three North American countries working cooperatively in the face of common risks and economic competition from low cost comulti-modal transportation system along the International Mid-Continent Trade and Transportation Corridor to improve both the trade competitiveness and quality of life in North America.

North American Facilitation of Transportation, Trade, Reduced Congestion & Security (NAFTRACS) is a three phase pilot project designed to focus on business processes and information as freight is transported from buyers to sellers. The project is intended to create a partnership between businesses and local, state, and federal governments, while claiming to foster cooperation among the same entities.

Announced funding

On 26 February 2008, Canada's Minister of Finance, Jim Flaherty, announced his Conservative government's 2008 Budget, which includes "$29 million over two years to meet priorities under the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America."³

North American Competitiveness Council

The North American Competitiveness Council (NACC) is an official tri-national working group of the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP). It was created at the second summit of the SPP in Cancún, Quintana Roo, Mexico, in March 2006. Composed of 30 corporate representatives from some of North America's largest companies, the North American Competitiveness Council has been mandated to set priorities for the SPP and to act as a stable driver of the integration process through changes in government in all three countries.

Trilateral summit meetings

Criticism

CNN anchor Lou Dobbs argues that the SPP is part of a plan to merge the United States, Canada, and Mexico in a North American Union similar to the European Union,¹¹ which has been referred to in other news reports as "mythical" and a "conspiracy theory".¹ Dobbs claims that US President Bush who will be in office until January 20, 2009, will bypass Congress and create a Union based on a Texas highway corridor.

The Council of Canadians claims that the SPP extends the controversial "no fly list" of the USA, makes Canadian water a communal resource, and forces Canada and Mexico to adopt the USA's security policies.¹²

On May 10, 2007, Conservative MP Leon Benoit, chair of the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on International Trade, prevented University of Alberta professor Gordon Laxer from testifying that SPP would leave Canadians "to freeze in the dark" because "Canada itself – unlike most industrialized nations – has no national plan or reserves to protect its own supplies" by saying Laxer's testimony was not relevant, defying a majority vote to overrule his motion, shutting down the Committee meeting, and leaving with the other three out of four Conservative members; the meeting later continued presided by the Liberal vice-chair. ¹³ After these disruptions, the National Post reported on a Conservative party manual to, among other things, usurp Parliamentary committees and cause chaos in unfavourable committees. ¹⁴ ¹⁵ The New Democratic Party has also criticized SPP for being undemocratic, not open to Parliament, and opaque ¹⁶; New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton described the process as not simply unconstitutional, but "non-constitutional," held completely outside the usual mechanisms of oversight. ¹⁷

Some thirty US-based organizations also sent an open letter to Congress on April 21, 2008 criticizing the secrecy and lack of any sort of democratic oversight:

Contents

Organization

Goals

Announced funding

North American Competitiveness Council

Trilateral summit meetings

Criticism

See also

References

External links