Thread: LUMBER LOBBY CHOPS NAFTA DOWN?

http://www.freemarketnews.com/WorldNews.asp?nid=5719

LUMBER LOBBY CHOPS NAFTA DOWN?
Thursday, January 19, 2006 - FreeMarketNews.com

A lobbying group representing the U.S. lumber industry has filed a lawsuit, charging President Bush and Congress with constitutional violations against free trade. According to a story in the Toronto Globe and Mail, the Coalition for Fair Lumber Imports is charging Bush and Congress of bursting the constitutional envelope when they "outsourced" control of U.S. laws to NAFTA dispute-settlement panels. The CFLI argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals that the North American free-trade agreement's dispute-settlement system is unconstitutional and should be struck down.

Its brief reportedly includes the following: "Congress impermissibly outsourced to [bi-national panels] the power to interpret and apply U.S. law and precluded all judicial review of decisions rendered by [bi-national panels]. Decisions that may be completely arbitrary and capricious, or rendered by biased panelists, cannot be reviewed by any court."

A hearing in the new case, which could end up before the U.S. Supreme Court, is expected as early as June, but no court date has been set. The defendants in the case are U.S. President George W. Bush, Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Robert Bonner.

staff reports - Free-Market News Network

WOW.....

RR

MAYBE, just MAYBE this will have a domino effect and a LOT of industries will follow suit.

http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stori ... 463&EDATE=

U.S. Lumber Industry Tactics Reach New Low


VANCOUVER, Jan. 20 /PRNewswire/ - Protectionist forces within the U.S.
lumber industry have reached a new low in their losing battle against fairly
traded Canadian softwood lumber imports.

After losing at virtually every legal turn, the U.S. Coalition for Fair
Lumber Imports (Coalition) has decided now to sue the President of the United States in a constitutional challenge to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Even though the U.S. government has supported the Coalition in its unjustified attacks against the Canadian industry, the Coalition has now turned around and sued its main ally, arguing that the NAFTA process, now that it has produced a result the Coalition dislikes, violates the U.S. Constitution.

"It's the ultimate sign of sheer desperation," said John Allan, president
of the BC Lumber Trade Council. "We look forward to working alongside the governments of Canada, the United States, and Mexico in defending the constitutionality of NAFTA and moving one step closer to the final resolution of this litigation."

The U.S. Coalition cries of "unfair subsidy" are ringing evermore hollow
as evidenced by its knee-jerk response to the Canadian government's recent program to ameliorate the impact of U.S. duties on Canadian lumber companies. That program simply allows Canadian lumber companies to use their own cash, which is sitting illegally on deposit in the U.S. pending the resolution of the litigation, as insurance against any loan they may take out to keep their businesses running.

"The U.S. Coalition impairs their credibility further by blaming all
their woes on the Canadian industry while their Canadian counterparts spend time and resources on modernizing mills to ensure efficiency and
competitiveness. The U.S. industry continues to assert that Canada is flooding their markets with 'cheap wood,' when the reality is that Canada's share of the American market has remained at an average of about 34% over the past ten years," said Allan.

The BC Lumber Trade Council is the voice for companies in British
Columbia representing the vast majority of BC lumber production. Its member companies account for about half of Canadian lumber production and half of Canadian lumber exports to the United States.

For further information contact:
Michelle Ward
NATIONAL Public Relations
(604) 970-5901 (cell)
mward@national.ca