The Clause "Ensuring Procurement Partners Respect Canada's Economic Interests" was enough to remind everyone that , we still did not Forget !
The indications - You will not be considered under Canadian Defence Procurement Strategy (DPS), if you are economically unfriendly with Canada, or were hurting Canada's economic interests in the past !
Established in 2014, the Defence Procurement Strategy is a government-wide initiative to improve defence procurement involving four core federal departments (National Defence, the Canadian Coast Guard, Public Services and Procurement Canada, and Innovation, Science and Economic Development).
Boeing is among the biggest military and civilian aircraft-makers in the world. In the year April 2017, Boeing had filed a trade complaint with the U.S. Commerce Department, alleging its business was being harmed because Bombardier's C Series passenger jet was unfairly subsidized by the Canadian government. Thats It !
At that time, Boeing's military division was in the process to sell the Royal Canadian Air Force a fleet of Super Hornet jet fighters , and that became history , the deal got cancelled, reasons were obvious !
The trade dispute further deepened. 300% duty was imposed on Bombardier aircrafts, Canada returned back the favour by making a policy that said, "companies that harmed Canada's economic interest would be at a disadvantage."
"In December 2017, the government announced that the evaluation of bids for the competition to replace Canada's fighter aircraft would include an assessment of bidders' impact on Canada's economic interests, and that any bidder that had harmed Canada's economic interests would be disadvantaged," said the budget.
"Budget 2021 confirms the government will apply this policy to major military and Coast Guard procurements going forward."
"Companies found to have prejudiced Canada's economic interests through trade challenges will have points deducted from their procurement bid score at a level proportional to the severity of the economic impact, to a maximum penalty," the budget says.
"This policy will protect Canada's economic interests and make sure the government does business with trusted partners who value doing business with Canada."
Boeing's decision in 2017 to launch a failed anti-dumping complaint against Bombardier continues to haunt the company's current bids for defense contracts from Ottawa.
Earlier, Canada disqualified Boeing from the CC-150 replacement contract and now this 'economic interest' clause will definitely hinder Boeing from bidding on Canada's $19-billion full replacement of all of the air force's aging fighter jets, a competition in which the bids are currently being evaluated with plans to sign a contract next year.
Boeing's other competitors are Lockheed Martin's F-35 Joint Strike Fighter and the Swedish Saab that is offering its Gripen fighter jets .
It will be interesting to see the final choice of Canada, given the baggage it is carrying that includes Price tags, economic policy and political agenda of current liberal goverment.
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