Anti-subsidy investigation, vehicle tariffs have strained ties between Beijing and European bloc
This article was written by Chan Hohim and was published in the Toronto Star on January 13, 2026.
China and the European Union said Monday they have agreed on steps toward resolving their dispute over the bloc’s imports of Chinesemade electric vehicles.
A “guidance document” released by the EU on Monday gives instructions for Chinese EV manufacturers on making price offers for battery EVs, including minimum import prices and other details. The EU had imposed tariffs of up to 35.3 per cent on Chinese EV imports in 2024 following an antisubsidy investigation.
The EU said minimum import prices must be set at a level “appropriate to remove the injurious effects of the subsidization.” Chinese EV manufacturers’ plans for investments within the EU will also be considered, it said.
“The European market is open to electric vehicles from all around the world, provided that they have come here according to that level playing field,” said European Commission spokesperson Olof Gill. “If those conditions are met, then we can look at price undertakings in a serious way.”
The EU said the European Commission would assess each offer in an “objective and fair manner, following the principle of nondiscrimination” and in line with World Trade Organization rules.
“This is conducive not only to ensuring the healthy development of ChinaEU economic and trade relations, but also to safeguarding the rulesbased international trade order,” a statement by China’s Commerce Ministry said. The China Chamber of Commerce to the EU welcomed the move, which it said would bring about a “soft landing” in the EV standoff.
The EU’s antisubsidy probe and tariffs on Chinese EVs had strained ties between China and the bloc. In late 2024, the EU imposed countervailing tariffs of 7.8 per cent to 35.3 per cent on Chinese battery EV imports for a fiveyear period.
As lowpriced Chinese EVs rapidly entered the European market, EU officials said China’s EV makers — with massive support from the Chinese government — benefited from “unfair” subsidization which threatened economic injury to EU auto manufacturers.
Monday’s announcement also came after the EU said last month it had opened a review into whether a price undertaking offer by Germanybased Volkswagen group’s Chinese joint venture could potentially replace the EU’s antisubsidy tariffs applied on its Chinabuilt EVs.
“The minimum prices offer Chinese brands probably some comfort to continue their exports long term … while avoiding higher import tariffs,” said Rico Luman, a senior economist at the Dutch bank ING who focuses on transport, logistics and the automotive industry. “I’m convinced the inroads of Chinese brands will continue.”
EU manufacturers depend heavily on Chinese made batteries, rare earths materials and computer chips. That requires “a balancing act to avoid frustrating the trade relationship” with China, Luman said.
Stephen Chan, an associate director at S&P Global Ratings, said some European demand of Chinabuilt vehicles could be constrained if the approved floor price under the new guidelines “significantly narrows the gap between Chinese BEVs (battery EVs) and European rivals.”
Chinese car brands are expected to gain more market share in Europe over the next few years, analysts said. Chinamanufactured cars rose to six per cent of sales in the EU in the first half of 2025, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) and S&P Global Mobility, up from five per cent in the same period of 2024.
EU manufacturers represented 74 per cent of total EU car sales in the first half of 2025, the ACEA said. Germany produced about 20 per cent of cars sold in the EU, followed by Spain, Czechia and France.
Ottawa in talks to lower tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles
This article was written by Tonda MacCharles and was published in the Toronto Star on January 13, 2026.
Canadian negotiators are in “active discussions” with China about lowering or dropping tariffs on Chinese made electric vehicles in exchange for easing punitive Chinese counter tariffs on Canadian canola and seafood, but government officials declined to say how it might affect Canada’s trade tensions with a U.S. administration that is hawkish on blocking China’s EVs from North America.
On the eve of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s trip to Beijing, the talks are considered so politically sensitive as the U.S. and Canada navigate the upcoming negotiation to renew the North American free trade pact that Canadian officials would say very little about the tariff dispute that is jamming Ottawa between China and the U.S. and opened a double trade war for this country.
A senior Canadian official, among several who briefed reporters on condition they not be identified in order to discuss the government’s position ahead of Carney’s departure, said there has been a “concerted effort to address trade irritants systematically with the objective of making progress over time.”
They said that after Carney met with Chinese Premier Li Qiang at the United Nations last fall and with President Xi Jinping at the AsiaPacific summit in Korea, there were extensive discussions between the two governments at ministerial and official levels “to address the irritants on both sides” — talks that were ongoing even as Carney prepares to arrive Wednesday evening in Beijing.
“This visit is really an opportunity to help put in place a much stronger foundation for ongoing cooperation in this regard. This is not our one chance to fix all the irritants … but we do expect to make progress,” they said.
Asked about the potential for the trip to aggravate U.S. President Donald Trump, the official said only that many countries have pursued trade diversification and broader economic relations with China, including the U.S., which has an “enormous commercial relationship” with the Asian economic giant.
Carney’s two days in the Chinese capital includes meetings with Xi, Li and the chairman of the standing committee of the National People’s Congress, as well as an official dinner hosted by Li.
For months, Canadian automakers have warned against any shift that would signal to the U.S. that Canada is softening on Chinese EVs.
In the fall of 2024, Canada matched U.S. tariffs against Chinese imports, imposing 100 per cent tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, and 25 per cent tariffs on Chinese steel and aluminum imports. When the tariffs on China were announced at a cabinet retreat, the Trudeau government made clear it was moving in lockstep with the Americans against Chinese “overcapacity.” China responded with countertariffs on Canadian canola oil and seafood. Prairie premiers like Saskatchewan’s Scott Moe have demanded that Ottawa try to ease the agricultural tariffs.
But Brian Kingston, head of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association, said dropping EV tariffs would be “incomprehensible” and “dangerous,” and could trigger a backlash from the U.S. at a critical time for the renewal of the CanadaU.S.Mexico free trade deal.
Mexico matched American and Canadian tariffs on Chinese electric cars “because they realize that this is critical if we’re going to have a protected North American integrated automotive industry,” Kingston said, adding that the economics just aren’t there.
“There is no fair competition with the Chinese automotive industry. They massively subsidized this sector and they are now dumping vehicles around the world,” he said.
This article was written by Colin Simpson and was published in the Toronto Star on January 3, 2026.
COLIN SIMPSON COLIN SIMPSON IS DEAN OF THE CENTRE FOR CONTINUOUS LEARNING AT GEORGE BROWN COLLEGE.
When General Motors shut down BrightDrop production at the Ingersoll CAMI plant this fall, Oxford County lost more than a thousand skilled jobs and a vital piece of Ontario’s manufacturing backbone.
Yet this does not have to be another chapter in the long decline of Canadian auto production.
The same facility that built cuttingedge electric vans could anchor a new, madeinCanada electricvehicle program, one built for ordinary Canadians, not just corporate fleets or luxury buyers.
For decades, CAMI has been part of Canada’s industrial DNA. Generations of workers have built vehicles that ended up in driveways across North America.
When GM converted the plant to produce BrightDrop electric delivery vans, it seemed to mark a new beginning, proof that Canada could lead the EV transition.
Instead, the market shifted, orders stalled and production ceased. The lights dimmed once more in Ingersoll. But those lights could, and should, come back on.
The frustration in the community is real.
Mike Van Boekel, chair of Unifor Local 88, which represents roughly 1,100 laidoff CAMI workers, recently said the union is ready to occupy the idled plant if GM attempts to remove equipment.
“The ball’s in GM’s court. If they don’t remove equipment, we won’t seize the plant,” he said, emphasizing that such a move is not his preferred option.
Van Boekel and Unifor’s national leadership have been working with the federal and provincial governments to persuade GM to assign a new vehicle to the site without success so far.
Canada has pledged to move toward zeroemission vehicles over the next decade, but policy targets alone will not get us there. Affordability and access will.
Imports from Asia and Europe remain costly and vulnerable to tariff swings. American EVs enjoy heavy domestic incentives. Meanwhile, most Canadians still cannot find an electric vehicle under $45,000, and middleincome buyers are being left out of the shift.
That is the gap Ingersoll can fill. Reopening CAMI to produce an affordable, practical EV designed and built in Canada would not only revive a skilled workforce but also give the country a sustainable business model for longterm competitiveness.
The plant already has the equipment, supply connections, and trained employees to get moving quickly. The infrastructure is there. The expertise is there. The opportunity is there. What is needed now is leadership and a business plan rooted in value, not virtue.
Imagine a compact hatchback or small crossover with a 300kilometre realworld range, built for our winters and our budgets.
Heated batteries, coldweather preconditioning, corrosion protection, a price tag under $40,000. This is the kind of vehicle that could replace the second car in millions of driveways or serve as the first EV for families who have been priced out of the market.
It is also the kind of product governments themselves could use.
If Ottawa and Queen’s Park want to strengthen domestic manufacturing, they can start by purchasing Canadian.
Committing to buy the first 25,000 units for fleets such as Canada Post, provincial utilities, school boards, and municipal services would give a reborn CAMI steady demand from day one. It is a proven approach.
Quebec’s and British Columbia’s early public orders for electric buses helped launch entire local industries.
This plan makes economic sense. Reusing existing facilities avoids the billiondollar costs of new construction. The Oxford County supply chain remains largely intact. Ontario’s energy rates are stable, and Canada’s electricity grid is among the cleanest and most reliable in the world.
Each job saved or recreated in Ingersoll supports several more across suppliers, transport, and service industries. For taxpayers, it is not a subsidy, it is a strategic investment that pays dividends in employment, trade balance, and technological knowhow.
Critics will argue that governments should not pick winners. But every country that succeeds in EV manufacturing, from the United States to South Korea, does exactly that.
The difference is how smartly they do it. A reborn CAMI would serve real domestic demand, compete in a price segment where the market gap is widest, and use the tools Canada already has in place.
This is not nostalgia for a lost auto town. It is an argument for sound economics. It is about making sure the transition to electric transportation supports local jobs, local suppliers, and local consumers instead of sending opportunity offshore.
Ingersoll does not need another “whatif” headline. It needs a reason to believe in its future, and so does the country. We already have the plant, the talent, and the tools. What we need now is the resolve to connect them.
If Canada is serious about building affordable EVs, protecting skilled manufacturing, and keeping value inside our borders, the path runs straight through Oxford County. The electric future does not have to be imported.
This opinion was written by Tony Keller and was published in the Globe & Mail on December 5, 2025.
It’s about time Canada stands to benefit from the progress in oil production and exports
Remember when Prime Minister Mark Carney, new to the job, kept saying “I am not a politician?”
Looking at last week’s OttawaAlberta memorandum of understanding solely through the lens of politics – the zero-sum, province-versus-province, Canadian cage-match version of the game – a lot of pundits are now wondering if Mr. Carney is, in fact, a political naif. They are wondering if he has just written his own political obituary.
Playing Santa to naughty Alberta? Giving a lump of coal to nice British Columbia? Hunh?
The Liberals won just two seats in Alberta in the last federal election, whereas they have 20 MPs in B.C., plus another 44 in Quebec. And yet here’s the PM ticking the boxes on the premier of Alberta’s gift list, while ignoring the wishes of the progressive and Liberal-friendly premier of B.C.
What gives?
What gives is that the PM is doing economics. He can add. He can also calculate how much subtraction has been done from the Canadian economy – first by his predecessor, and now by that guy in the White House.
Canada has an economic problem. Part of the solution – I hope you’re sitting down; you may experience dizziness – is oil.
The oil is mostly in Alberta. For those joining us late, that’s in Canada.
A Canada that produces more oil, exports more oil and in particular exports more oil to Asia rather than the U.S., is now explicit federal policy, and a pillar of the Carney government’s agenda.
Why? Because it’s economically necessary.
Canada’s major economic challenge for the last generation has been anemic productivity growth. The major source of the problem was, and is, anemic Canadian business investment. The issue became especially pronounced after 2014. Relative to our neighbours in the U.S., far less money was being invested by the private sector in raising the economy’s productive capacity – how much Canadian businesses produce, and how efficiently they produce it.
The Carney government inherited this long-standing problem, which has been recently supercharged by U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade policies.
The Trump effect on the Canadian economy is out of our hands. But the Canadian government’s impact on the Canadian economy? That’s entirely in our hands.
We can give ourselves more than others can take away, as Mr. Carney likes to say.
What his new oil policies acknowledge is that, for the last decade, Canada’s own policies were taking from Canada. Those would be the Trudeau government’s policies that effectively limited the growth of oil production and oil exports. These were an economic subtraction mechanism.
On page 55 of last month’s federal budget, there’s a chart that gives the lay of the land. From the early 2000s until 2014, Canadian business investment actually outpaced U.S. business investment. The reason, as the chart shows, was massive investment in building out the Canadian oiland-gas sector. By one estimate, $227-billion went into the oil patch.
The result was a steady boost to Canadian employment and incomes. It was centred in Alberta – again, that’s where the luck of the draw put most of the oil – but the dollars flowed across the country. People moved from other provinces for work, but jobs also came to them. That’s because the oil patch bought everything from steel and aluminum to cars and banking services from the rest of Canada.
Another happy side effect was that we had a relatively mild recession in 2008-09, whereas the U.S. had a Great Recession that lingered for years.
The Alberta government’s coffers were enriched more than those of any other province, but every province benefited through growing economic activity and higher tax receipts. So did the federal government.
The investment boom ended after 2014, when global oil prices slumped. But thereafter, the Trudeau government worked to ensure that the pre-2014 boom would not be repeated, even as prices recovered.
The world continued to invest a lot of money in new oil production, notably in the U.S., which has grown into the world’s largest oil producer.
But uncertainty about how any additional oil produced in Canada could get to market, or whether an emissions cap on the sector would make additional production impossible, tamped down talk of major new investment in Canadian oil.
The Carney government intends to reverse that. It is trying to author a sequel to the last oil patch investment boom.
The Ottawa-Alberta agreement is, politics aside, an economic plan whose aim is increasing business investment in Canada. To the extent the investment happens, the result will be higher Canadian economic growth, and higher Canadian incomes.
This opinion was written by Andrew Coyne and was published in the Globe & Mail on December 3, 2025.
Everyone could find something to hate about the energy agreement – technically, the Canada-Alberta Memorandum of Understanding – Mark Carney and Danielle Smith struck last week.
For the right, the conditions on federal support for a heavy oil pipeline from Alberta to the West Coast – notably, a tightened provincial carbon pricing regime – are too onerous, if not altogether unnecessary. For the left, it is the pipeline’s costs that are too great: not only in itself, but also in the form of federal emissions regulations that were traded away as part of the deal.
As for the scorekeepers in the pundit class, several were agreed that Mr. Carney and his closest advisers had been snookered, politically. All they would achieve by their concessions to Alberta is to run into a brick wall of opposition from British Columbia and Indigenous groups, divide the federal Liberals and raise the federal NDP from the grave. Not to mention sink Liberal support in Quebec, especially after the resignation of former environment minister Steven Guilbeault from cabinet.
Whew. Apparently Mr. Carney, the former Goldman Sachs dealmaker, is a terrible negotiator, exceeded in incompetence only by Ms. Smith, who was roundly booed for her efforts at the United Conservative Party convention the next day. Each, it seems, gave away the store to the other.
Or perhaps they are not such simpletons as all that.
What, first, is the nature of those concessions? The cap on emissions in the oil and gas sector the feds have agreed to scrap has been estimated to cost at least $800 per tonne of emissions averted, just in compliance costs, and as much as $2,887 per tonne when all economic losses are considered. Likewise, the federal clean electricity regulations from which Alberta would be spared imply compliance costs, even on the government’s own numbers, of more than $200 per tonne – much more, if economic losses are included.
By comparison, carbon pricing is a steal – even at the much-elevated price the two governments have agreed to. The $130 price mentioned in the agreement is a minimum price, not a ceiling; and it is the market price of a credit, not the “headline” or compliance price (the penalty a company would have to pay if it neither reduced its emissions nor bought credits on the market). Credits are currently trading at about $20 to $25 on Alberta’s Technology Innovation and Emissions Reduction market, so this represents about a sixfold increase.
But what’s to prevent Ms. Smith from agreeing to carbon pricing now, then scrapping it after the pipeline is built? Two things. One, the “financial mechanism” mentioned in the MOU is code for “carbon contracts for difference”: a kind of futures contract, protecting firms that invest in lower emissions from being left holding the bag should carbon pricing be scrapped or lowered at some future date (as the government would then have to pay the difference between the actual and projected price).
And two: the pipeline only proceeds if the Pathways carboncapture-and-storage project does – the agreement is explicit on this. And Pathways is only feasible at a carbon price of at least $130 a tonne. No carbon pricing, no Pathways; no Pathways, no pipeline. Alberta hasn’t just given a political commitment to carbon pricing. It’s baked into the whole deal.
But what about the politics? Certainly it will not be easy to bring the government of B.C. on board, though Premier David Eby has already signalled his acquiescence (he cannot legally block it) so long as the tanker ban off B.C.’s north coast is maintained. That’s doable: the pipeline could take a different route, or regulations of equivalent effect could be implemented, much as Alaska did after the Exxon Valdez disaster.
Indigenous groups, likewise, can in principle be compensated (again, they have no veto in law) by being given a share of the equity in the project. Not every group will be mollified, but not every group has to be: only a politically critical mass.
Essentially, both Mr. Carney and Ms. Smith have, in their different ways, made the same bet: that there are more votes to be gained in the middle ground than there are to be lost on the fringes.
Whatever pains the deal may cause for Mr. Carney in B.C. (where a majority is in support of the project) or Quebec (where Mr. Guilbeault is half as popular as Mr. Carney), or with the still leaderless NDP, these must be set against the opportunity to steal the centre-right vote from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, and possibly reinvent the Liberals in Western Canada.
As for Ms. Smith, the deal offers a way out of the trap in which she is now caught, as the darling of a separatist movement that is widely rejected in the province. Those boos? I’m guessing they were music to her ears.
This article was written by Eric Atkins and was published in the Globe & Mail on November 17, 2025.
General Motors was given more than half a billion dollars of government money, partly to help retool a factory in Ingersoll, Ont., to build BrightDrop electric parcel vans, but now the plant is closed, the vehicle scrapped and 1,150 workers are laid off.
Governments must now decide how to respond after giving companies billions in subsidies
It was the spring of 2022 and federal and Ontario government officials stood on the floor of a General Motors plant in Oshawa, Ont., to announce they were giving the automaker more than half a billion dollars.
The Detroit-based carmaker would use the money as part of a $2-billion plan to reopen the Chevrolet Silverado truck plant in Oshawa and retool a factory in Ingersoll, Ont., to build BrightDrop electric parcel vans.
Politicians took their turns at the microphone to declare the money would secure high-paying assembly jobs, reduce GM’s cost of making cars in Ontario and forge Canada’s future as a centre for green-vehicle manufacturing. Each government’s contribution was up to $259-million.
“Folks, this is just another huge win for the people of Durham and all of Ontario,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford told reporters.
“Today is proof that Canada’s auto sector is here for the long term,” said François-Philippe Champagne, then Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry. Or not.
Fast-forward to today and the picture is very different. The Ingersoll plant, known as CAMI, is closed, the BrightDrop scrapped and 1,150 workers are laid off. In Oshawa, the third shift of workers – including about 700 jobs – is set to be eliminated in January and truck production is declining.
Meanwhile, GM has boosted production of the Silverado in Fort Wayne, Ind., and is busily retooling a plant in Orion, Mich., to make more of the pickup trucks by 2027.
The moves are spurred by U.S. President Donald Trump’s 25-per-cent tariffs on Canadian-made vehicles, and poor sales of the BrightDrop. Similarly, Stellantis NV said in October it would move planned production of the Jeep Compass to Illinois from its plant in Brampton, Ont. That factory was also being retooled with taxpayer support.
“General Motors appreciates that support from the Canadian and Ontario governments enabled investments in CAMI and Oshawa and is committed to working closely with Unifor and our government partners as we evaluate next steps for the future of CAMI,” GM spokeswoman Jennifer Wright said in an e-mail.
She declined to provide details of the agreements with governments. The automaker has invested more than $2.6-billion in Canada in the past five years, she said, including $280-million in Oshawa.
Even before Mr. Trump began his campaign of destroying the Canadian auto sector, parts of the industry were not in great shape. Long-term production had declined and two assembly plants were idled for retooling: Ford in Oakville and Stellantis in Brampton. But the retreat has gained pace since Mr. Trump took office. Brampton’s future is now a question mark, Ingersoll is empty and Oshawa is shrinking.
The bad news raises questions about the wisdom of taxpayer handouts to carmakers that can walk away when times change, laying off thousands at assembly plants and the parts factories that supply them.
The grants GM received from governments were to cover capital expenses of building the Oshawa and Ingersoll assembly lines and related work. Typically, governments give automakers grants worth 20 per cent of their capital budgets.
Jason Clemens, executive vice-president of the Fraser Institute, calls the auto subsidies “corporate welfare” and bad public policy that lead to higher taxes with no long-term economic gain.
But if governments did not come up with the money in 2022, the GM plants would not have reopened and the jobs would be long gone, said one person familiar with the matter, whom The Globe and Mail is not identifying because they are not authorized to speak publicly.
The same can be said for much of Ontario’s broader auto sector – its presence has long relied on government aid.
Without subsidies, “we would have seen a much bigger decline in our auto industry over the last generation,” said Jim Stanford, economist and director at the Centre for Future Work.
For decades, taxpayer aid for the Canadian auto sector has encouraged companies to keep plants running, retool and continue to provide well-paying jobs. Canada competes for these plants with the U.S. and Mexico, which also offer rich subsidies and, in some cases, lower pay and nonunion shops.
Government aid to GM and other automakers in Canada goes back decades and amounts to many billions of dollars.
In 2009, Canada gave $13.7-billion in aid to GM Canada and Stellantis to help the companies survive the financial crisis. GM’s share was $10.8-billion; taxpayers were left with a $2.8-billion loss, according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
In 1987, governments gave GM and partner Suzuki $112-million in grants and incentives to build the Ingersoll plant – the one now shuttered.
The same year, GM received $220-million in interest-free loans from governments for its plant in Ste-Therese, Que. It left the province in 2002.
Tens of billions more in government subsidies were earmarked for various EVbattery makers in Canada in recent years, just ahead of a slowdown in demand for electric cars.
That includes aid worth up to $15-billion for Stellantis and LG Energy for the NextStar battery plant in Windsor, Ont. That agreement was announced in 2023, when the assumed pre-eminence of electric cars was unquestioned and Mr. Trump’s tariffs unforeseen. As EV sales slump, NextStar says it has shifted its focus to stationary batteries – not EVs – as production starts this month.
Now, Canadian governments are figuring out how to respond to companies they’ve funded now pulling back from Canada.
In October, Mr. Champagne, as Finance Minister, notified GM he is “disappointed” by GM’s production cuts in Ontario and reduced the automaker’s tariff-free import quota by 24 per cent, while also reducing Stellantis’s quota.
Details of the agreements governments and automakers reach are confidential. Financial aid usually takes a few forms: cash grants, tax breaks or production subsidies.
Generally, there are strings attached related to employment, production and amounts spent by the companies themselves.
Ontario’s legal team is in touch with GM to ensure the funding agreements are respected and enforced, said Jennifer Cunliffe, a spokeswoman for Ontario’s Minister of Economic Development Victor Fedeli. She did not address questions about how much of the $259-million has been granted to GM.
The department of Innovation, Science and Economic Development said $236million in federal money had been “disbursed” to GM by the end of fiscal year 2023-2024 but declined to say what job guarantees accompanied the funding.
“The government is actively engaging with General Motors to ensure all outstanding conditions under the … agreement are fulfilled,” the department said in a statement, describing the funding as “partially repayable.”
The U.S.-imposed tariffs and the slowing growth in demand for battery-electric vehicles upended recent government subsidy policies, said Saibal Ray, a professor at McGill University.
“Before Trump, you can make a case these were necessary and were perhaps effective, but today it’s not clear because there is no guarantee that things will work as they are meant to work,” Prof. Ray said.
Peter Frise, a professor at the University of Windsor, said carmakers are good at forecasting how production plans and consumer demand will let them fulfill financial covenants with governments. But the Trump era turned that on its head.
“They have a very deep insight into what’s going [to] happen next and how far they can go and what promises they can make,” Prof. Frise said. “But what has happened this time is they’ve been completely whipsawed by events in the United States around the tariffs and the dropping of the battery EV rebates.”
He added, “I really don’t ascribe bad faith to the companies right now. I’m not happy with what they’ve done. But I’m not sure what options they had. I think they feel they have to throw the White House a bone.”
Still, the Fraser Institute’s Mr. Clemens said the GM and Stellantis cuts highlight governments’ poor track records of selecting winners. The money would be better spent reducing taxes and creating conditions for all businesses to succeed, he said.
This article was written by Emma Graney and was published in the Globe & Mail on November 11, 2025.
Federal Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne says Canadians ‘understand that the natural resources sector is key to national prosperity, to investment in the country.’
The second phase of LNG Canada is a “game changer” for Canada and underscores how attitudes to energy have changed in recent months, the federal Finance Minister says.
François-Philippe Champagne said Monday that Canadians today understand “the nexus between economic security, energy security and national security” – a vast change from the general view across the country six or nine months ago.
“I think that there’s more openness to an Energy Corridor than before,” Mr. Champagne told an afternoon Calgary Chamber of Commerce event.
“I think people understand that the natural resources sector is key to national prosperity, to investment in the country, to who we are as Canadians in many ways.”
Take LNG Canada, a liquefied natural gas export terminal in Kitimat, B.C., he said. The facility’s co-owners are expected to make a final investment decision in 2026 on whether to forge ahead with a Phase 2 expansion, which would double the plant’s total capacity to 28 million tonnes a year.
“LNG Phase 2 is a game changer,” Mr. Champagne said. “People see that we can play a key role in India, in the Pacific. If you want to be at the big table, you have to talk about energy.”
Global uncertainty and the trade war with the United States has been something of a “wakeup call” for Canada to get its house in order, he said, including around energy security.
Last week’s federal budget did not answer all of the regulatory questions hovering over Canada’s energy sector. That includes the end of the oil and gas emissions cap, which was floated – but never implemented – by former prime minister Justin Trudeau. Instead, the budget said the cap wouldn’t be needed if the sector takes other measures to cut pollution.
Mr. Champagne said he believes it provided some of the certainty that the energy sector needs to make investment decisions, but he acknowledged there is still more to do on the regulatory front.
It’s a challenge, he said, but “this is not the time for half measures. This is not the time to think on the margins.”
Mr. Champagne was set to speak with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith on Monday evening, as Alberta and Ottawa work to repair their fractured relationship.
Pointing to Western Canada’s ambition and economic success, Mr. Champagne said the Calgary based Major Projects Office sends a message to Alberta – and the world – that Canada means business.
However, he declined to comment on what will be in the next tranche of projects to be referred to the office. That list is slated to be released Thursday by Prime Minister Mark Carney in Prince Rupert, B.C.
“We already have a number of natural resource projects to build our country, whether it’s in the mining sector, whether it’s in port expansion,” he told media after the event.
Mr. Champagne’s message to the audience Monday was light on climate, though he doubled down on the importance of trade corridors, saying the budget’s trade corridor infrastructure fund will be key to ensuring products from Alberta – including oil and gas – can have access to markets.
He also said it was important for Canada to embrace the opportunity to develop its critical minerals sector.
Very few countries have a critical minerals mining industry or an oil and gas sector the size of Canada’s, he said. Now, it’s just a matter of “reaching our full potential.”
When it comes to critical minerals specifically, he said, it’s important for government to work alongside the private sector to ensure products make it to market. Oil and gas are the same, he told media after the event, adding that Ottawa aims to attract muchneeded investment.
“Western Canada has been building for decades,” he said. “My aim in this budget is really to put the framework for these companies to say, ‘Yes, we’re going to invest again in Canada, bring our products to market and make sure that at the same time, we create the great jobs.’ ”
This article was written by Wenran Jiang and was published in the Toronto Star on November 7, 2025.
WENRAN JIANG, FOUNDING DIRECTOR OF THE CHINA INSTITUTE AND MACTAGGART RESEARCH CHAIR EMERITUS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA, IS PRESIDENT OF CANADACHINA ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT FORUM AND AN ADVISER AT THE INSTITUTE FOR PEACE AND DIP
Global Affairs Minister Anita Anand’s recent trip to Beijing, which reset bilateral relations by reaffirming the CanadaChina “strategic partnership,” has been significantly bolstered by the upcoming meeting between Prime Minister Mark Carney and President Xi Jinping at the APEC forum.
This highlevel engagement underscores a deliberate move from both capitals towards a substantive reset. As Anand stated, this reengagement is necessary “given the changing global strategic and economic environment.”
But Ottawa’s diplomatic outreach carries the weight of a deeply divisive domestic issue: Canada’s 100 per cent tariff on Chinese electric vehicles. While Premier Doug Ford declares “no damn way” the tariff will be removed, Western premiers demand its elimination, citing devastating retaliatory tariffs on their agricultural exports.
This regional fragmentation undermines Canada’s national interest. Carney’s approach, emphasizing that “relationships rebuild over time” and framing the engagement as building a broader relationship rather than a single transaction, provides a more realistic foundation for negotiations.
This aligns with his earlier comments on the “danger of overdependence on single trade partners” and signals a necessary strategic shift away from extreme positions toward a unified national strategy to negotiate mutual deescalation.
The current policy’s cost is already severe. The tariff prompted immediate Chinese retaliation, crippling key sectors like canola, pork, and seafood. Western provinces face a genuine crisis, with canola exports to China — a market worth $5 billion annually — hit hard. In Saskatchewan alone, canola exports plummeted by 76 per cent in August.
Meanwhile, Ontario’s protectionist stance is increasingly disconnected from reality. Canada’s domestic EV production is minimal, with little progress despite massive government subsidies. The tariff isn’t protecting a thriving industry; it’s sacrificing one regional economy for questionable benefit.
Canada should look globally for a more nuanced approach. Other nations show the choice isn’t between a 100 per cent tariff and none. The U.K., Australia, and Japan have no tariffs, while the EU uses calibrated rates from nine per cent to 36 per cent by manufacturer, addressing subsidies while avoiding consumer harm. The EU’s model is particularly instructive. It shows how to address subsidization while avoiding a trade war. Within this framework,
Chinese investment continues. Canadian auto parts maker Magna assembles Chinese EVs in Europe, proving smart regulation can balance competition with cooperation — a model Canada could adapt. Canada should propose a gradual reduction of its EV tariff from 100 per cent to a more reasonable 30 to 50 per cent, explicitly tied to China lifting its retaliatory tariffs on Canadian agricultural goods. This would provide immediate relief to our farmers and stabilize a critical trade relationship.
But the negotiation will go beyond tariffs, as Carney emphasized, to include both “commercial relationship as well as the evolution of the global system.” Canada should leverage its rich lithium reserves and skilled workforce to attract Chinese investment in the domestic auto sector.
Encouraging joint ventures for battery production or EV assembly in Ontario would create the manufacturing jobs that tariffs alone promise but cannot deliver.
Beyond economics, the current policy undermines Canada’s broader goals. By excluding affordable Chinese models, we are slowing EV adoption and hindering progress toward our 2030 climate targets; with Canadians having access to just two electric options under $45,000 compared to 11 such models in Europe, affordable Chinese EVs could accelerate adoption.
Furthermore, a negotiated solution would strengthen Canada’s economic sovereignty by diversifying trade partnerships and reducing overreliance on the United States.
The path forward requires strategic unity. The 39minute CarneyXi meeting was a critical opportunity to translate highlevel diplomacy into a balanced package: moderate EV tariff reduction in exchange for agricultural market access and binding commitments on Chinese investment.
This approach serves all regions — stabilizing western farms, creating Ontario jobs, and advancing environmental goals. With this highlevel engagement underway, Ottawa must transcend internal divisions and seize this opportunity for pragmatic cooperation.
This opinion was written by Eric Reguly and was published in the Globe & Mail on November 1, 2025.
Industrial growth forecasts combine hard economic data on trends with pure guesswork. So it’s no surprise they are often wrong. Anything from sudden political upheaval to berserk weather can make a mockery of any estimate.
If there is one forecast that seems safe to make, it is this: Canada will keep shedding auto industry jobs with alacrity. Blame Donald Trump and his relentless tariff salvoes and Canadians’ waning appetite for overly expensive electric vehicles.
Almost every month, the Canadian auto sector is walloped with news of factory slowdowns or closures, layoffs or delayed investments. Recently, General Motors announced the end of production in Ingersoll, Ont., of its BrightDrop EV, a commercial van; Stellantis said it would transfer output of the EV Jeep Compass from Brampton to Illinois; and Honda revealed a twoyear delay of its $15-billion EV and battery project in Alliston.
The vanishing act is not limited to EV plants. The Paccar plant in Quebec, which builds heavyduty Kenworth and Peterbilt diesel trucks, has been laying off workers since late last year and waved adieu to another 300 employees in October. Production is being shifted to the U.S. to avoid Mr. Trump’s tariffs on Canadianmade vehicles.
The Big Three – GM, Ford, Stellantis – will probably never expand in Canada as long as Mr. Trump occupies the White House, even if Ontario and Ottawa keep throwing obscene amounts of taxpayer-funded incentives at them. Tens of thousands of auto jobs have disappeared already. If the Ontario or federal governments have a plan to prevent the industry from going ungently into the night, it’s not known.
The sector’s salvation could lie in Chinese investments – and Hungary provides some insight.
The auto industry has gone into reverse across the European Union, with the exception of Hungary, where Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has maintained friendly ties with Moscow and Beijing.
His love affair with China is paying off, with €10-billion or more of Chinese EV and battery investments completed or announced, most of them in the eastern part of Hungary.
Among them is the €7.3billion CATL battery plant, one of the biggest of its kind in the world. Other Chinese companies are building smaller battery plants, and BYD, Tesla’s main rival in the global EV market, is building Europe’s first Chinese owned EV assembly plant in Hungary.
For the EU overall, the Chinese investments in Hungary are a mixed blessing. Germany’s automakers – Volkswagen, BMW and Mercedes – welcome the Hungarian battery plants – Mercedes is CATL’s biggest customer. But the EV factories could spell trouble for European automakers.
Chinese EVs have been coming on strong in the export market because of their relatively low prices and greatly improved technology. In Europe, BYD is the fastest-growing auto maker in terms of registrations, with a more than 300-per-cent rise in the first eight months of 2025, compared with the same period last year.
But for Hungary, the arrival of the EV and battery plants is a huge win.
Which brings us to Canada. With the American-owned car industry going south – literally – Canada and Ontario need a fresh automotive strategy. Why not invite the Chinese car and battery makers into the market?
Mr. Carney told reporters that Canada and China have reached a ‘turning point’ in their relations.
BYD is keen for an industrial presence somewhere in North America and came close to building a factory in Mexico in the past year or so. It’s known that the company also approached Ontario with a proposal to build trucks in the province. But the Trump trade war killed BYD’s North American ambitions. And even before that, Canada followed the Biden administration’s lead and imposed a 100-per-cent tariff on Chinese EVs last year. China retaliated with 100-per-cent tariffs on Canadian canola oil and meal and a 25-per-cent levy on Canadian seafood and pork products. Prime Minister Mark Carney is trying to make nice with China as Mr. Trump’s MAGA policies threaten the Canadian economy. This week, he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in South Korea and accepted an invitation from Mr. Xi to visit China. Mr. Carney told reporters that Canada and China have reached a “turning point” in their relations. China has offered to drop the canola tariffs if Canada removes the tariff on Chinese EVs. There is a win-win scenario here, one that would see Canada open its market to Chinese EVs if BYD or any of its rivals were to create jobs in Canada. That would mean building EV assembly plants on Canadian soil, presumably in Ontario. The idea seems radical, given the recent trade and political tensions between Canada and China. But Mr. Trump has changed the global geo-economic calculus virtually overnight. Chinese EVs are taking over the global EV market. Canada can play a role in that success story or sit back and watch its auto industry disappear. In 1992, U.S. presidential candidate Ross Perot coined the phrase “giant sucking sound” to describe his belief that Mexico would rob the U.S. of a huge number of jobs if the North American Free Trade Agreement were implemented. The same sound can be heard today as the U.S. robs Canada of auto jobs.
This article was written by Rob Ferguson and was published in the Toronto Star on October 31, 2025.
In a nudge to the federal government, Premier Doug Ford is taking another step in his push for an east west energy pipeline by ordering a feasibility study into the potential project amid a trade war with the U.S.
The study backed by Alberta and Saskatchewan will look at the costs, as well as route options, to link oil and natural gas from the two western provinces to “new and established refineries” in southern Ontario and new ports on the Great Lakes, Hudson Bay and James Bay, Ford said in a statement Thursday.
“This nationbuilding pipeline and energy corridor will unite our country and help unlock new markets for Canada’s energy resources that will reduce our dependence on the United States,” Ford added.
But there are no privatesector companies proposing any such pipelines as yet.
The study is intended to keep pipelines top of mind as Prime Minister Mark Carney considers the next round of major infrastructure projects his government will prioritize in November, said Todd McCarthy, the Ontario minister handling the file while a cabinet colleague is on maternity leave.
“We’re not waiting, but we hope that the federal government will join us,” McCarthy told reporters. “The conversation is just beginning.”
On Parliament Hill, the feds were noncommittal.
“Canada will always work constructively with provinces to build energy infrastructure that addresses the needs of Canadians, while partnering with Indigenous Peoples and protecting our environment,” said Greg Frame, spokesperson for Energy and Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson.
“Ultimately, it is the responsibility of proponents to bring viable, robust projects forward.”
There was immediate pushback to the study from environmental groups, who scoffed at new pipelines as a “1970s” idea and doubted the public would accept oil tankers on the Great Lakes — a drinking water supply and playground for tens of millions of people.
“We could be fasttracking renewable energy made with Ontario steel and create jobs now,” said Green Leader Mike Schreiner, noting it would take years to get a pipeline built and operating.
He also questioned the ability to put a deepwater port on James Bay because it is a shallow body of water.
“At a time when the world is racing to get off fossil fuels, it makes no sense to spend valuable public dollars studying this latest, and most fanciful, pipe dream,” Keith Brooks, programs director of Environmental Defence Canada, wrote in a statement to the Star.
“It will make us vulnerable to climate and economic risks while locking in decades of pollution.”
McCarthy would not provide an estimate for the cost of the study to be completed next year, saying Ontario is in the “early stages” of pulling it together.
“Rather than paying highpriced consultants to study how to get more climatedestabilizing fossil fuels onto a world market that is going electric, we should be building wind and solar power here at home to power Ontariomade heat pumps and electric vehicles,” said Keith Stewart of Greenpeace Canada.
Ford maintained an eastwest pipeline would boost the economy by using Canadian steel, make the country more selfreliant and create thousands of jobs to offset the damage of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
The three jurisdictions behind the study “are proving what’s possible when provinces lead and stand together to advance a shared vision of responsible development, economic freedom and common sense,” said Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.
“Access to domestic and international markets is critical,” Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe added in a statement. “New pipeline infrastructure will strengthen Canada’s energy security and help us become a global energy superpower.”
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