EU invites Canada to become 'associate member' as US ties sour

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1:00Sinus and ear infection, UTIs, stomach bug, travelers diarrhea and more. On hand before you need them. Use your doctor-developed guidebook to select the right prescription or call their telemedicine doctor standing by. It's like an urgent care and drugstore at home. When you're sick, traveling or stranded, you'll wish you ordered a medical emergency kit. Order online in minutes and it's shipped to your door and say $45 with my promo code blue at urgentcarekit.com slash blue. That's promo code blue at urgentcarekit.com slash blue. Well, after facing repeated trade and tariff threats from US President Donald Trump, Canada and the U are now talking about an unprecedented relationship. The U today proposed adding Canada as its first ever associate member. The offer came as Canadian Prime Minister, as you can see there, Mark Carney, as an visitor to Europe. It is not clear exactly how the associate membership would work or what exactly would entail. That you're being commissioned President Signal, this is not a response to strain relations with the US, but about forming a natural partnership with a long time ally.

2:07We will integrate defense industrial bases. We will make the Arctic a flagship joint project. We will work on energy critical minerals and batteries on AI quantum cyber and economic security. This is not a partnership against anyone else, but for our common strength. Let's get more honest to it joins me now. I'm not sure whether we've got many answers to the question. What exactly then is this associate membership? It doesn't exist, right? What more do we know about this? No, I mean the EU is not like a gym with multiple tiers of memberships. We're not quite clear what associate member is. Clearly Canada is not in Europe, it's not becoming an EU member state. It's not trying to be. We have accession members that want to be full EU members and nothing else, really, other than I guess that Shengen agreements and trade agreements. But yeah, an associate member. So we don't have the details.

3:07We know it's not a trade deal because the EU and Canada already have a free trade deal. A great one. It was signed around nine years ago and it means that something like 90% of trade between the two countries is currently tariff free. Extraordinarily, despite it being implemented, I think nine years ago on a provisional basis, I think 10 EU member states still haven't ratified it to this day. So that leaves us with a question, what could this be in real terms? First of all, I'm delaying did mention manufacturing technology, AI, defense, energy, critical minerals, economic securities as all areas they could be looking at to cooperate with. And some people question, well, what could each side want from a closer partnership? From the EU side, perhaps they'd want greater access to Canadian gas or critical raw minerals, for instance. From the Canadian side, perhaps they would like to be able to live and work throughout the EU block, that would clearly be very valuable. So there are areas that they could work upon, but we just don't know yet, you say? To Le Vondelae, I ended up saying that this is not a partnership against anyone else.

4:10But the timing is interesting, right? So I wondered whether people are reading it to this because it comes, of course, as Canada faces a deteriorating relationship with the United States over these aggressive use of tariffs. So speak to that and the timing of this, Anna. Yes, there is a trade war between the US and Canada. And hey, we have context going back months, right at the beginning of the year. Prime Minister Karney was at Davos and he made quite a splash when he said in a speech, there is a need for middle powers to act in concert amid a rupture in the world order. And it wasn't a struggle for anyone to see that this was to do with the trade policy of the US and allies from Canada and Europe then working together. So this isn't new in that sense. There is a sense that there's going to be a stronger alliance. And there was actually a very interesting part of the speech today from Le Vondelae. I'm not only the bit you mentioned where she says this isn't about, you know, this isn't political, this isn't a move against anyone. She did say we will integrate defense industrial bases and we'll make the Arctic a flagship joint project.

5:14Now of course Arctic, Greenland, that is very much a hot topic when it comes to Trump relations. So you know, you can read in a little bit of politics, I think. Associate member is still undefined as we've noted. What could Canada gain beyond its existing trade deal with the EU that was signed in 2017? And then what would Europe expect in return? Dave Roberts here. There you are surrounded by fans, sharing wings, sharing drinks, high-fiving random strangers. Everybody remembers the game. Nobody remembers the guy coughing behind you until a few days later. At 2 a.m., you wake up with a fever and your throat's on fire. Now what? Urgent care, clothes, ER, slam, telehealth, maybe, but the pharmacies close. You needed a medical emergency kit. These aren't first aid kits. They contain essential prescriptions used for over 30 common conditions. Sinus and ear infection, UTI, stomach bug, travelers diarrhea and more. On hand before you need them. Use your doctor-developed guidebook to select the right prescription or call their telemedicine doctor standing by.

6:18It's like an urgent care and drugstore at home. When you're sick, traveling or stranded, you'll wish you ordered a medical emergency kit. Order online in minutes and it's shipped to your door and say $45 with my promo code blue at urgentcarekit.com slash blue. Come on and get happy with happyGLP.com. At just $99 a month, happyGLP gives you one set price every month. No tears, no tricks. Getting started with happyGLP is fast, convenient and happens virtually with a licensed provider. Check it out for yourself at happyGLP.com. That's happyGLP.com. A happy price for a happier you. Compounding medications are not FDA-approved, eligibility required and determined by a licensed provider individual results may vary. See website for details. Well, first of all, I should say something about Mark Carney. I've gotten to know him, I've worked with him. He's a smart, he's irrational, he's a thoughtful man.

7:20Canadians are lucky to have him. If only we could clone more Mark Carney's and the world would be a better place. To answer your question, it's not clear what the EU has in mind. What clearly isn't going to happen is Canada getting the same deal as members of the European economic area, which essentially have all the benefits of the single market and free movement of people and they pay into a pot. Canada is not going to get that. It's going to get something, clearly. This is an important political statement, but we're not sure what. A lot of areas of collaboration were mentioned, even in the clip you just played, and critical minerals and batteries and tech and AI and so forth. But we don't know. But this is an important political statement, because the EU is essentially echoing what Mark Carney said in Dallas and January this year. The middle powers, the so-called middle powers, also have their power. And the EU, well, should understand it's a middle power and Canada's a middle power. But together they can be more powerful and they can protect themselves by diversifying their trade agreements and working together on those areas I just mentioned.

8:30Just talk to us more specifically about which sort of Canadian exports would actually benefit if there was to be some kind of associate EU membership. And which Canadian businesses would be most disrupted by a pivot away from the United States, which obviously Canada is very heavily dependent on the US for trade, if it was to pivot away from the United States towards the EU. Well, I don't think that they're going to think of it in those terms of pivoting away because the importance of the US market to Canada clearly cannot be made up by somehow pivoting to the EU. But it needs to diversify with the EU and others, which is why Canada is signing lots of free trade agreements as the EU is with many members. So the importance of the US Canada relations will stay. And they're very careful to say we're not doing this to alienate anyone, the EU is not doing this to alienate anybody. We have to see what areas are going to grow. I mean, maybe agriculture has always been a very tough one, right? That's part of the reason why the US didn't get its own free trade agreement negotiations over the line to my great regret.

9:41I was involved in that, but you can think of energy, you can think of lots of other areas. But the volumes are not going to make up for the US market as my main point. So we know President Trump wanted Canada to be the United States 51st state, Canadian opposition Pierre Poli has said that it won't be its 51st state and it won't be the EU's 28th member. So what is the message that Mark Carney and Ursula Bonderlion herself, what are they sending to the United States in terms of how they see future relations with America? The message, I think, is very clear. The message is we have options. There are other players in the world. And the message also to the world and to investors is made by the EU and Canada is, by the way, we together are a region of stable rules. And we believe in the rule of law, we believe in multilateralism and we're a predictable place to do business. And all of those things have a value for investors.

10:52And Canada is calling a major meeting of investors and I believe judging from what I've seen in the press trying to get a trillion of investments into Canada. Because investors are looking for stability in the world. This is highly volatile and unpredictable.