OTTAWA—Canada’s wide-ranging but largely secret trade deal with the United States and 10 other Pacific Rim countries is reigniting questions about the economy, jobs and the country’s future just as Canadians get ready to vote.

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper, whose government signed the 12-nation agreement two weeks before the election, lauded it as a long-term economic advantage that will open up growing export markets in Asia.

“Today is a historic day. It is a great day for Canada. It is a great day for Canadians,” Harper said during a press conference after negotiators initialed the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

But the NDP and Liberals blasted Harper for confronting Canadians with a major decision about their future in the form of an international deal they know little about.

“I will not be bound by Stephen Harper’s secret deal,” NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair declared during a campaign event in Toronto.

Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau said Canadians can’t pass judgment on the agreement without seeing the details.

“We will commit that the ratification process for this deal will go through a full responsible and open discussion both in Parliament and with Canadians so that we make the right decision going forward for Canada,” Trudeau said Monday in Waterloo.

Announcing the TPP deal, Harper promised to put up $4.3 billion to protect farmers and to provide new investment incentives for the auto industry to soften adjustments to reduced protections for those sectors in the new pact.

Ontario Agriculture Minister Jeff Leal said the fact that Ottawa is planning compensation for farmers shows the TPP is a flawed, unbalanced agreement.

“If it’s balanced it doesn’t need compensation,” Leal told reporters at the legislature in Toronto, adding the Ontario government needs to do a “detailed analysis” of the trade deal.

“The big challenge is now that we’re in the latter stages of a federal election campaign and there could be a different government in place on Oct. 20,” Leal said.

Harper told reporters Ottawa had no choice but to be part of the TPP agreement because otherwise Canada would have been out of step with the United States, its biggest trading partner. The U.S. government spearheaded the TPP talks stretching back five years.

“Most of the time, when you are at a (negotiating) table like this, there are two possibilities: you either have an agreement or you don’t have an agreement,” Harper said. But, in this case the 11 other countries could have gone on without Canada, he said.

“If that had happened, that (would have been) a final decision, and we clearly don’t believe in that. We clearly have a deal we think we should be part of . . . and the decision for the next Parliament will be whether to ratify and implement or not.”

But Unifor, which represents autoworkers, said the TPP puts 20,000 jobs in the auto sector at risk. “This is a trade deal that will have a significant impact on Canada. It will replace the NAFTA, our most important trade relationship. And all the signs point to the TPP posing a major threat to good-paying jobs in Canada,” said Unifor National President Jerry Dias.

Mulcair, who is focusing his election campaign on ridings in southern Ontario and Quebec where the auto and dairy industries are crucial, accused the Conservatives of “selling out our autoworkers and farm families.”

Only the rough outlines of the TPP deal were available Monday. International Trade Minister Ed Fast said Ottawa has asked the other TPP signatories if the text of the agreement could be released before the Oct. 19 election. And Harper said if re-elected he would likely put the agreement before Parliament for ratification in early 2016.

The practice of keeping trade negotiations fully secret is a recent trend, and MPs have often complained about being left in the dark while Ottawa signs deals affecting everyone’s future.

Promising a Liberal government would open up the TPP to the public, Trudeau said, “We will demonstrate the kind of openness and responsibility that quite frankly we haven’t had in 10 years of Stephen Harper’s government.”

The TPP agreement reduces or eliminates barriers in a wide range of sectors and could lead to more Canadian exports of pork, beef, canola, high-tech machinery and a variety of other products.

It also entrenches new international trade standards in Asia, setting a template should any other countries in that fast-growing region, such as China, want to join someday.

“This is an exciting moment for Canada,” said Canadian Chamber of Commerce President Perrin Beatty. “I want to thank our negotiators for their hard work in securing an agreement that will help create jobs, spur innovation and increase consumer choice across Canada, while positioning us at the forefront of global trade developments.”

But Canada made concessions that will be controversial, particularly reduced protections for the auto sector.

In a joint statement, Ontario Economic Minister Brad Duguid and Agriculture Minister Leal said they were disappointed by the outcome of the negotiations for the car industry. “Ontario is concerned that the TPP auto concessions will rapidly expose both Ontario’s auto assembly and parts producers to much stiffer global competition, especially when compared to the U.S. concessions, potentially placing the jobs and livelihoods of many Ontarians at risk.”

And some observers said the trade advantages of the TPP are being oversold by Ottawa.

“You hear people talking breathlessly about a new market of 800 million people with the TPP,” said Scott Sinclair, senior researcher with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. “But our trade with the TPP members with which we don’t already have a free-trade agreement is quite modest.”

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There are also concerns the deal will drive up prescription drug costs, hamstring Crown corporations and entrench multinational corporations’ power to challenge government measures in Canada and other TPP countries.

But it may be years before the full implications of the TPP are clear. The new deal will supersede NAFTA, the pact that has largely governed Canada’s trade prospects for two decades. And it is too early to say how the TPP will interact with Canada’s free trade deal with the European Union, an agreement that has yet to be ratified in Europe.

Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall applauded Canada’s participation in the trade pact.

“This is a huge deal for Canada as a trading nation and Saskatchewan as a trading province,” he said. “The agreement builds on the strengths of the other free trade deals Canada has struck and opens up new opportunities for our exporters in the fast-growing and lucrative Pacific markets.”

The 12 nations in the TPP include Canada, the U.S., Mexico, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, Singapore, Vietnam, Malaysia, Chile, Peru and Brunei.

With files from Tonda MacCharles, Rob Ferguson and The Canadian Press

Timeline of Hurdles

Oct. 19, 2015: Canadian federal election.

January 2016: TPP may go before Parliament for vote.

February 2016: TPP likely goes before U.S. Congress.

Nov. 8, 2016: United States presidential election.

2017: Ratification needed by all TPP countries.

Compromises on the Way to TPP Deal:

Cars will be allowed to be imported into Canada without tariffs, as long as they have 45-per-cent content from the TPP region, which is significantly lower than the 62.5 per cent regional-content provision under NAFTA.

Foreign suppliers will have increased access — 3.25 per cent — to the Canadian dairy market.

Imports representing approximately 2.3 per cent for eggs, 2.1 per cent for chicken, 2 per cent for turkey and 1.5 per cent for hatching eggs will be allowed into Canada.

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