New Generation Trade Treaties — The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership

Abstract

INTERNATIONAL union rights Page 28 Volume 22 Issue 3 2015 were made to ILO Conventions, reaffirming workers ’ rights, that nothing in the agreement could bind corporations and secure enforcement of rights, and nothing was included to protect collective agreements. Finally he argued that CETA and TTIP, if agreed, would provide the opportunity for corporations to challenge differences between employment law regimes of EU member states, undermining the basis for social Europe and facilitating the race to the bottom. A north American perspective on trade agreements was provided by Ben Davies (USW). He outlined some of the differences between EU and US standards and how, in the area of chemicals, TTIP could lead to the undermining of the EU’s precautionary principle (where chemicals must not be used until evidence indicates they are safe). He provided evidence of the difficulties of using ILO conventions within free trade agreements (not least due to their low level of ratification in the US) and how the US state has not responded to the assassination of trade unionists in Guatemala, despite complaints filed under the bilateral trade agreement over 7 years ago. Despite the challenges , the USW continued to campaign and lobby actively against these new generation trade agreements and stressed the importance of building support against TTIP and CETA from among the European trade union movement. Discussions surrounding the position in Europe included contributions from Penny Clarke (EPSU) who stressed the federation’s opposition to ISDS and the liberalisation of public services, Steve French (Keele University) who examined the TTIP negotiations in the light of the proposed referendum on EU membership in the UK and Ben Richards (Unite) who examined the issues in building support across European trade unions to oppose free trade agreements. He highlighted the contrasting positions of CO Industri (Denmark) and CGT-FTM (France) within IndustriALL-Europe and how agreement was being forged around key principles which had to be applied in any new generation agreement. The final speaker was Labour MEP, Judith Kirton-Darling, who stressed the opportunity that the new generation trade agreements might play in re-regulating international trade, and the role of Labour MEPs within the social democratic bloc within the European Parliament in trying to secure opposition to TTIP if it did not exclude ISDS, public services and secure binding labour rights. She highlighted the difficulties in building a coalition to oppose TTIP in the Parliament, and the difficulties in gaining access to information about the treaty. In summary, the seminar was an excellent event to promote debate and understanding around the complex and apparently remote topic of international trade agreements for many trade unionists. to be added T his is a brief report of a three-day seminar organised by Unite the union in July 2015, focusing upon the growth of free trade agreements and trade union responses. Opening the seminar Adrian Weir (Assistant Chief of Staff, Unite) placed the seminar into context, outlining how Unite had adopted a position of opposing TTIP in in its entirety at its policy conference in July 2014 and how this position had been adopted in relation to the proposed TTIP, CETA, TPP and TISA trade agreements at the 2014 TUC Congress. Finally, the steering group of Workers Uniting (Unite-USW partnership) had committed to full opposition to these new trade agreements. The seminar was then addressed by Peter Rossman (IUF) who outlined how the development of the new generation trade agreements, starting with NAFTA in 1994, was little to do with removing trade barriers, and focused upon protecting the investment rights of transnational corporations . One example was the attempt to extend trade deals to services, affecting those services associated with manufacturing as well as public services traditionally supplied by the state. Crucially, one aim of the new agreements was to apply a principle of ‘negative listing’, so that governments could only exclude services from a trade agreement at the time of signature, meaning that returning these to the public sector and excluding new emergent sectors would become impossible, locking in privatisation. This would be secured through Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) clauses in agreements which allowed corporations to take governments to secret courts for loss, or even the...