Ottawa to table bill to keep products of forced labour out of Canada

The federal government plans to table a bill Friday that would change the way Canada bars imports of products made with forced labour.

The move is being seen as a response to the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump mulling new tariffs targeting Canada and other countries over their forced labour practices.

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Dominic LeBlanc, the minister overseeing Canada-U.S. trade, said Thursday Canada is working to address “long-standing concerns” Washington has about “non-tariff barriers.”

United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer’s office recently recommended an additional 10 per cent tariff on multiple countries — including Canada, Mexico and the United Kingdom — it claims are not doing enough to enforce domestic bans on forced labour.

The Trump administration must launch further public consultations before it can impose the tariff. Prime Minister Mark Carney said last week Canada already has a very strong forced labour regime but legislation would be introduced to crack down on it further.

Advocates have long argued Canada does a poor job of enforcing existing rules meant to bar products made through slavery, a point Carney acknowledged Thursday.

“We have … a very strong framework and responsibilities — legal framework and standards and responsibilities. We’ve been … less effective in fully enforcing those, and some of that relates to how the responsibilities are structured legally, some of it relates to resources,” he told reporters in Toronto.

Carney said Thursday his government is eliminating a watchdog position responsible for investigating allegations of human rights violations committed by Canadian companies abroad.

The Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE), introduced under the government of Prime Justin Trudeau, was tasked with investigating potential abuses, including the use of forced labour. Carney said the office hasn’t been effective.

On March 25, however, Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand said the position “remains important” and suggested work was underway to fill the role.

With Anand now in Europe, her parliamentary secretary Rob Oliphant is likely to table the legislation on forced labour Friday.

Under the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, Ottawa changed the wording of a customs law on forced labour rules in 2020 to prohibit imports of goods “that are mined, manufactured or produced wholly or in part by forced labour,” putting Canadian tariffs in line with CUSMA rules.

But the White House says there has been little evidence Canada has stepped up enforcement.

Washington has said the Canada Border Services Agency does not appear to publish official information about its enforcement efforts and cited numbers suggesting enforcement is weak.

It also has pointed to a report by the Coalition Against Forced Labour that said Canadian border officials intercepted only 50 shipments on suspicion of forced labour, and just two shipments were turned away.

The border agency has said it has intercepted and detained 50 shipments over concerns about forced labour since 2020. Two shipments were found to have been produced using forced labour — a 2024 shipment of textiles and one in 2025 containing frozen seafood.

Former Liberal MP John McKay, who championed a 2023 law to bar slave products, has pointed out the U.S. allows private firms to produce exports using prison labour. He has accused the Trump administration of letting enforcement slide on a law to weed out Uyghur forced labour from China.

Advocates have accused Ottawa of failing to adequately enforce its 2023 legislation. While Ottawa can issue fines and launch investigations under the law, it hasn’t used it to access private companies’ records or issue penalties for non-compliance.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 12, 2026.