Harper Urged to Appoint Cabinet-Level Border Czar

(The Gazette)

Canada’s truckers and manufacturers pressed Prime Minister Stephen Harper on Tuesday to appoint a cabinet-level border czar to preserve and enhance cross-border trade and traffic and to help avoid what one MP says could be a “tourism calamity” when new passport rules kick in later this year.

The Canadian Trucking Alliance, which represents the country’s 400,000 truckers, and the Canadian Council of Chief Executives told a committee of MPs on Tuesday that border delays are likely to worsen, not improve, under the new U.S. administration.

They said the federal government needs to make someone politically responsible for co-ordinating a Canadian response to this threat to Canadian trade. Read more here.