Stockwell Day
Minister of International Trade
Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade
125 Sussex Drive
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0G2

Dear Mr. Day:

I am writing to express concerns about the issue of postal services in the upcoming negotiations towards a comprehensive economic agreement between Canada and the European Union (EU).

The EU has an aggressive agenda for deregulating postal and courier services, as demonstrated by its plurilateral request during the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) negotiations at the World Trade Organization and its plans for post offices within Europe. The EU has issued a directive requiring all countries to fully deregulate their post offices as of 2011, with the exception of 11 member states which will be given until the end of 2012.

The CUPW strongly urges you to resist making any commitments that would liberalize Canada Post’s postal and courier services. We would like your assurances that Canada intends to protect these services with fully effective reservations.

We also urge you to continue to oppose any efforts to change the classification of postal and courier services, especially along the lines of the modifications that have been advanced by the EU in the GATS negotiations.  Such changes, by narrowing the scope of the current protection for postal services, would almost certainly undermine our public postal system.

Finally, the union requests that you reject any new disciplines for designated monopolies and state/public enterprises and any proposals which would put new restrictions on the regulation of postal services, including the addition of a "reference paper" or new obligations imposing so-called pro-competitive regulation on the postal sector.

It is our view that there is currently no pressing need to make changes to postal and courier services and no consensus within the country that measures promoting postal liberalization, privatization and deregulation are necessary or desirable.

We would appreciate a letter outlining your views.

Yours truly,

Denis Lemelin
National President

c.c.

National Executive Committee
Regional Executive Committees
National Union Representatives
Regional Union Representatives
Specialists
CUPW locals
Louis Levesque, Deputy Minister for International Trade, DFAIT
David Plunkett, Director General, Bilateral and Regional Trade Policy, DFAIT
David Christopherson, MP
Mario Laframboise, MP
Joseph Volpe, MP
Rob Merrifield, Minister of State (Transport)
John Baird, Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities
Peter Julian, MP
Scott Brison, MP
Serge Cardin,MP
Moya Greene, President, Canada Post
Gerard Power, Vice-President, International, Canada Post