Prime Minister Mark Carney is hosting Canada’s premiers today in Ottawa as the provinces grapple with the effects of Chinese and U.S. tariffs.
The meeting is taking place just days before Carney is expected to launch a federal election campaign that would send Canadians to the polls as soon as April 28.
The meeting with the premiers will be held this afternoon at the Canadian War Museum.
Audrey Champoux, a spokesperson for Carney, said earlier this week the session would be a chance to discuss creating a single Canadian economy, instead of 13 separate ones.
Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe said Thursday his priority for the meeting with Carney is to discuss China’s tariffs on Canadian canola oil and meal.
Beijing imposed the tariffs in response to Canada’s levies on Chinese-made electric vehicles, steel and aluminum.
“(This is) the most urgent and the most immediate (tariff) that needs action,” Moe told reporters in Regina. “I don’t know if we can solve it but we ought to try, and I would ask the prime minister to make that phone call (to China) before you go to an election.”
Former prime minister Justin Trudeau’s final meetings with premiers, which took place before Carney was sworn in on March 14, focused on U.S. tariffs.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war escalated last week when Washington imposed 25 percent tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports entering the country, prompting Canada to expand its retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods.
Trump also has repeatedly suggested that Canada should become the 51st state.
