Dawson Strategic

On April 12, 2013, the Mowat Centre of the University of Toronto and the Canada-U.S. Law Institute of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland successfully launched the Council of the Great Lakes Region (CGLR).  Dawson Strategic played a key role in the inception of this organization. While still maintaining DS client work, Laura Dawson will serve [...]

Last week Stefania and I visited the border quagmire that is the Cornwall-Massena crossing. Despite my claims of being a  border “specialist” I ended up facing seizure of my vehicle and stiff fines because I turned right to visit the Akwasasne Mohawk community on Cornwall Island instead of proceeding “forthwith” to the temporary customs checkpoint [...]

In a paper released by the Fraser Institute as part of a collection of essays on the U.S. election,  Laura Dawson argues that Canada-U.S. economic relations have been on autopilot since the 1989 Canada-US Free Trade Agreement and the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement. In light of the recent shift in economic focus towards Asia, the leaders [...]

The Canada-U.S. Regulatory Cooperation Council and Beyond the Border initiatives are nearing the end of their first year of bilateral meetings and stakeholder outreach.On December 12, Christopher Sands and I will meet at the Wilson Center in Washington to discuss the progress in the first year and to introduce our new paper “A Safe and [...]

No one can argue that international trade consulting opens doors to a lot of travel — sometimes nearby, sometimes halfway around the world.  In October 2012, we spent three days in Buffalo, NY attending the Ontario Motor Coach Association Annual Meeting, working with members of our US-Canada Motor Coach Coalition on ways to make the [...]

Since Dawson Strategic is active in both US and Canadian policy issues, we could not help but be caught up in the drama and speculation leading up to the US presidential elections. Laura honed her punditry skills as a recurring election panelist on CTV’s Powerplay.  Host Don Martin and various US panellists were a lot [...]

Join panelists Laura Dawson, Gerald D. Chipeur and Peter Foster for an Economic Club of Canada lunch in Toronto on Wednesday June 13th. This panel will discuss the legal, policy, and political challenges that Canada and the U.S. need to overcome in order to create a more prosperous relationship. For more information or to register, click here. [...]

Dawson Strategic is pleased to announce the formation of the Canada-US Motor Coach Passenger Coalition (MCPC) to streamline the movement of motor coach passengers across the Canada-US border. The Beyond the Border Action Plan announced by Prime Minister Harper and President Obama in February 2011 announced plans to work towards pre-clearance for passengers and cargo [...]

In response to the demographic pressures of the baby boom generation entering retirement and the labour market demands of Canada’s surging energy sector, the Government of Canada is using immigration policy to fill labour market demand.  Permanent resident programs are being reconfigured to focus on skills-based criteria for admission and temporary foreign worker (TFW) programs [...]

If RIM is targeted by foreign investors, the Canadian government will face tough choices regarding net benefits to Canada and implications for national security, argues Laura Dawson.  In a commentary for the Macdonald-Laurier Institute entitled Potash and BlackBerries: Should Canada treat all foreign direct investment the same? Dawson argues while the sale of Canada’s flagship intellectual property (IP) company to a foreign [...]