Minister Mulroney holds a dominant majority in the House of Commons, however, the opposition Liberal Party holds a majority in the Canadian Senate. The Canadian Senate has refused to hold a final vote on the FTA, until after the results of the November election. If the Progressive Party is returned to power in the House of Commons, the Senate may be expected to approve the agreement, because such an election result would be inferred as an approval of the FTA by the Canadian electorate. Should the Progressive Conservative Party fail to gain a majority in the new House of Commons, however, the Senate may be expected to return the FTA to the house of Commons, where both opposition leaders have promised to either scuttle or renegotiate the deal.
In mid 1985, the Brian Mulroney, the Canadian Prime Minister, formally asked the US for an initiation of free trade talks, which would lead to the negotiation of a free trade agreement between the two countries. Actual talks began in the summer of 1986, after the US Senate agreed to a Reagan Administration request for fast track talks. The fast track provision means that, once a treaty agreement is presented to the Congress, it cannot be amended by the Congress. It must be either accepted or rejected as negotiated.
Between the time of the initial agreement between the Reagan Administration and the Mulroney Government in early October 1987 and the time the FTA was presented to Congress in early 1988, however, the Congress was free to negotiate with the administration on changes it required to ratify the agreement. Any such changes negotiated between the administration and the Congress, however, required renegotiation between the Reagan Administration and the Mulroney Government.
In Canada, the federal Parliament has the authority to ratify a free trade pact for the country. Under the Canadian federal system, however, only the provincial governments have the authority...