WHAT SORT of “Trade Agreement” manages to both criminalise internet use and force coal seam fracking onto communities? The answer to this is the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a pact that has the ominous potential to achieve both these corporate objectives — and many more. Of course, we cannot know the exact effects of the TPP, as the negotiations over the past few years have been held in secret. However, two leaked chapters – out of the 26 or more under negotiation – have caused more than their fair share of concern. One of these chapters threatens to undermine both our existing domestic and international legal systems, throwing away the protections and rights achieved over hundreds of years. How? Through tribunals linked to a system of International Investor-State Dispute Settlements (ISDS). The one in the TPP lead to an open letter signed by prominent Australian judges, lawyers, politicians and academics insisting that the government should not sign an agreement that includes ISDS. The letter states: ‘…the increasing use of this mechanism to skirt domestic court systems and the structural problems inherent in the arbitral regime are corrosive of the rule of law and fairness.’ But ISDS is most definitely included in the proposed TPP put forward by United States negotiators.
Posted on: Sat, 05 Oct 2013 05:44:39 +0000
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