Today, the Honourable Chrystia Freeland, Minister of Transport and Internal Trade, met with her provincial and territorial counterparts at the Committee on Internal Trade (CIT) meeting in Québec City to advance shared priorities and strengthen Canada's domestic economy.
Over the past six months, the federal government worked with the CIT to facilitate internal trade and labour mobility across Canada by:
- Removing unnecessary exceptions from the Canadian Free Trade Agreement (CFTA), creating new opportunities for Canadian businesses to buy and sell interprovincially and compete for government procurement.
- Reaching an agreement in principle to include the financial services sector into the CFTA by end of Fall 2025.
- Expanding the Mutual Recognition Project in the trucking sector to reduce costs and improve efficiency. Minister Freeland invited transportation officials and experts to a Trucking Hackathon on July 15-16 in Toronto to identify new opportunities to make it easier to transport goods across Canada by aligning regulations in the trucking sector.
- Advancing mutual recognition for goods (except for food) by December 2025, making it easier to buy and sell Canadian goods across the country.
- Committing to implement an Action Plan on labour mobility, including a 30-day service standard to process labour mobility applications.
- Signing a Memorandum of Understanding to implement a direct-to-consumer alcohol sales system by May 2026, at the latest.
- Agreeing to launch internal trade missions to foster business growth and promote trade across Canada.
In addition, the federal government recently announced the elimination of all federal exceptions in the CFTA. The government has also successfully passed the Free Trade and Labour Mobility in Canada Act as part of Canada's new One Canadian Economy Act. This legislation will eliminate federal barriers to the movement of goods, services and labour within Canada, while upholding the health, safety and security of Canadians, their social and economic well-being, and the environment.
The federal government will continue to work toward the removal of remaining barriers to internal trade and labour mobility to ensure all Canadian businesses and workers have access to a seamless and integrated domestic market.
