The text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (deal similar to TTIP, but for Pacific Rim countries) has been agreed. However, there are some US politicians who are already calling for it to be re-negotiated, because big pharmaceutical corporations don’t think they get enough. See here for more on this.
But the negotiations are completed, although it still has to be ratified by the parliaments of all the 12 countries – including by the US Congress.
So now the text of the deal is no longer secret, and campaigners say that it’s worse than they originally thought it would be.
See this video from Democracy Now! which includes a great explanation of the what’s in store from TPP from Lori Wallach of Public Citizen – who really knows how to explain trade deals in terms that people understand. 16 minutes, but really worth watching.
Public Citizen is a US consumer organisation started by Ralph Nader – notice that they don’t betray consumers in the same way that UK ‘Which?’ does (see here).
Intriguing to hear how US ‘long established US food safety standards’ will be undermined by Asian imports, which is exactly the argument we make with TTIP when it comes to imports from the US!
Here’s an explanation of what TTP will mean, and why it’s worse than we though, from Public Citizen:
Secret TPP Text Unveiled: It’s Worse Than We Thought, With Limits on Food Safety and Controversial Investor-State System Expanded, Rollback of Bush-Era Medicine Access and Environmental Terms
Pact’s Fate in Congress Uncertain at Best; Long-Awaited Text Reveals Gaps Between Administration Claims and Actual TPP Terms On Key Congressional, Public Concerns
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today’s long-awaited release of the text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) reveals that the pact replicates many of the most controversial terms of past pacts that promote job offshoring and push down U.S wages while further expanding the scope of the controversial investor-state system and rolling back improvements on access to affordable medicines and environmental standards that congressional Democrats forced on the George W. Bush administration in 2007.
“Apparently, the TPP’s proponents resorted to such extreme secrecy during negotiations because the text shows that the TPP would offshore more American jobs, lower our wages, flood us with unsafe imported food and expose our laws to attack in foreign tribunals,” said Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch. “When the administration says it used the TPP to renegotiate NAFTA, few expected that meant doubling down on the worst job-killing, wage-suppressing NAFTA terms, expanding limits on food safety and rolling back past reforms on environmental standards and access to affordable drugs.”
On some key issues, the text reveals provisions that will cost TPP support from members of Congress who supported the narrow passage of Fast Track trade authority this summer, and affirm for the many members of Congress who backed past trade deals but opposed Fast Track that the TPP must be stopped.
For the full text, see here.
