{"id":2273,"date":"2017-10-13T16:10:26","date_gmt":"2017-10-13T16:10:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/marijuana-elds-and-nafta-top-issues-affecting-transport\/"},"modified":"2025-01-10T16:48:56","modified_gmt":"2025-01-10T16:48:56","slug":"marijuana-elds-and-nafta-top-issues-affecting-transport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/marijuana-elds-and-nafta-top-issues-affecting-transport\/","title":{"rendered":"Marijuana, ELDs, and NAFTA Top Issues Affecting Transport"},"content":{"rendered":"

The legalization of marijuana, the electronic logging device (ELD) mandate, and the possible reworking of NAFTA were three of the biggest issues facing the Canadian transport industry, according to Stephen Laskowski, president of the Canadian Trucking Alliance and Ontario Trucking Association.<\/p>\n

Laskowski, speaking on a panel at the Surface Transportation Summit this week, said Canada is in danger of dropping the ball when it comes to protecting employers when marijuana becomes legalized next July.<\/p>\n

Truck News<\/strong><\/em> reports:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe decision was made to legalize marijuana. That\u2019s fine, we\u2019re moving on. But the issue here is, the government must have the fortitude to stand up beside employers and say that in safety-sensitive positions we\u2019re going to allow drug and alcohol testing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Employers will have difficulty determining whether or not their employees are high on the job, as there is currently no test available that determines impairment.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was rushed from the beginning,\u201d Laskowski said. \u201cIt\u2019s a complicated issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rail industry is equally concerned, according to Gerald Gauthier, vice-president of public and corporate affairs with the Rail Carriers Association of Canada.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur concern is the impact of marijuana on safety-sensitive positions,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s a drug. It has an impact on your concentration.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Canadian version of the U.S. ELD mandate should soon be posted in the Canada Gazette<\/em>, Laskowski, adding shippers will need to work with carriers to better manage the supply chain.<\/p>\n

Bob Ballantyne, president of the Freight Management Association of Canada, said his members are eager to do so.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s going to have to be a lot of cooperation,\u201d he acknowledged.<\/p>\n

Laskowski said it\u2019s estimated only 30-40% of carriers are currently using ELDs. Implementing them, he said, can require a 12- to 18-month transition period.<\/p>\n

Asked if drivers and owner-operators will exit the business rather than adopt ELDs, Laskowski said most fleets report drivers come to like them.<\/p>\n

\u201cTime is money,\u201d he said. \u201cDrivers no longer have to fill out paperwork. It\u2019s easier to audit. There are a lot of other time savings that equal money at the end of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

The renegotiation of NAFTA was another concern listed by the panel. Laskowski said the ongoing NAFTA talks at least provide an opportunity to get trucking issues back on the table with government. He noted the CTA made submissions to government<\/a> on more than 13 areas that could be improved with regards to border operations.<\/p>\n

\u201cGetting the attention of government on some of our micro issues in transportation is difficult,\u201d he said. \u201cHere is an opportunity\u2026we have a wonderful opportunity to modernize NAFTA. There are a number of issues we\u2019d like to work on as the trucking industry, and hopefully we\u2019ll get an opportunity to discuss them.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The legalization of marijuana, the electronic logging device (ELD) mandate, and the possible reworking of NAFTA were three of the biggest issues facing the Canadian transport industry, according to Stephen…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":464,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,16,62],"tags":[73,433,736,542,79],"class_list":["post-2273","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-border-customs","category-business-conditions","category-operations-safety","tag-elds","tag-electronic-logging-devices","tag-laskowski","tag-marijuana","tag-nafta"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2273","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2273\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cantruck.ca\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}