US embassy cable - 05OTTAWA1105

UNCLAS OTTAWA 001105 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
STATE FOR WHA/CAN (HOLST, WHEELER), EB/TRA (BYERLY) 
 
STATE PASS USTR FOR SAGE CHANDLER 
 
TRANSPORTATION FOR OST/IA (EDDIE CARAZO AND SUSAN MCDERMOTT) 
 
COMMERCE FOR 4320/MAC/WH/ONIA/WORD 
 
FAA FOR KRISTA BERQUIST 
 
DHS/TSA FOR SUSAN WILLIAMS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: EAIR, ECIN, EINV, CA, Transportation 
SUBJECT:  CANADIAN OFFICIALS SUGGEST THAT MINISTER LAPIERRE'S 
WISH FOR PUBLIC DEBATE ON AIR LIBERALIZATION AND QUEBEC 
SCANDAL HAVE SLOWED MOVEMENT TOWARD OPEN SKIES DISCUSSIONS 
 
REF:  E-mail Byerly - Gallagher April 8, 2005 
 
SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED--PLEASE PROTECT ACCORDINGLY.  NOT 
FOR INTERNET DISTRIBUTION. 
 
1. (SBU) Emboffs met on April 6 with Chief of Staff to 
Minister of Transport Jean Lapierre, Leslie Swartman, and 
Lapierre's Senior Policy Advisor, Paul Stothart, to discuss 
the Government of Canada's (GOC) slow steps toward air 
liberalization discussions.  When Lapierre and Secretary of 
Transportation Mineta met in Ottawa at the end of February, 
they had announced that they were about to embark on 
"exploratory discussions" regarding a more liberal aviation 
agreement.  (Comment:  Secretary Mineta had gone so far as 
to suggest that a bilateral Open Skies agreement would be an 
important step toward realizing the "vision of NAFTA" in 
aviation.  Minister Lapierre had stated that the "window of 
opportunity to move ahead is now open."  End comment.) 
 
2.  (SBU) Emboffs observed that almost seven weeks later, 
with both the Minister and the Secretary seemingly having 
been keen on moving forward, it is surprising that the GOC 
has not yet moved to engage in exploratory discussions. 
Swartman and Stothart initially explained that Transport 
Canada officials (including themselves, who are both new to 
their jobs) "needed more time to understand the issues" that 
are to be discussed.  They then indicated that Minister 
Lapierre, who is also the Prime Minister's chief lieutenant 
for Quebec politics, is engaged with the revelations of 
putative Liberal party corruption in Quebec that threatens 
to bring the government down.  Accordingly, air 
liberalization has taken a back seat to the scandal 
investigation.  The Minister is not pushing his officials to 
commence discussions now on a potentially politically 
sensitive file, although, they added, his clear preference, 
as articulated in speeches and during his meeting with 
Secretary Mineta, is to begin discussions. 
 
SIPDIS 
 
3. (SBU) Swartman and Stothart also noted that, with respect 
to the study now being undertaken by the House of Commons 
Standing Committee on Transportation, the Minister does 
indeed feel obliged to let the Committee do its work before 
he gets Transport involved in meeting stakeholders and 
developing a GOC agenda, which confirms Kris Burr's message 
to U/S Shane (ref B).  Furthermore, Swartman and Stothart 
provided the same timeline of being ready to start official- 
to-official meetings in late August, with a preferred date 
to announce this effort being September 19 in Toronto at the 
ACI conference. 
 
4. (SBU) On April 8 Emboffs met with Cliff Mackay, CEO of 
the Air Transport Association of Canada (ATAC).  Mackay 
provided the same opinion as Swartman, Stothart, and Burr 
with respect to the Committee deliberations having forced a 
slowdown in getting the discussions underway.  Minister 
Lapierre had expected the Transportation Committee to lead 
nationwide public debate on liberalization.  In addition, 
Mackay told us that domestic cargo carriers remain adamantly 
opposed to liberalization.  In the current volatile 
political climate, even starting low-level exploratory talks 
would be courting additional political dangers for the 
government that it clearly doesn't want right now. 
According to Mackay, the small Canadian cargo carriers 
believe that pilots' unions scope clauses will not allow 
these small cargo operators to effectively link up with big 
U.S. cargo carriers.  On the other hand, Mackay observed 
that the Transport Canada bureaucracy as a whole is not 
"pushing back" on the Minister's liberalization agenda, 
something that could not have been taken for granted a few 
years ago. 
 
Dickson