The bad news is that the Labour government has endorsed the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, with the suspension of a limited range of items, at the ministerial and leaders’ meetings in Da Nang, Viet Nam.
The Japanese PM Abe is now trying to pressure Canada to finalise the agreement whilst they are in Vietnam. Can you please help us in tweeting PM Trudeau, Canadian Trade Minister and the Canadian Foreign Minister.
@JustinTrudeau @FP_Champagne @cafreeland
There is no doubt the new government has been working hard to achieve some protection for NZ from ISDS in the TPPA. But is asking the other parties for side-letters, similar to the one signed by Australia and NZ, saying they won’t let their investors use the TPPA’s investor-enforcement mechanism against us a solution?
It’s like watching a car crash in slow motion.
This is the time for action. It is time to hold the new government to account through every avenue you have available.
The TPPA is a brilliant stealth attack by the tech industry, often symbolised by the acronym GAFA (Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple). In recent years, they have massively increased their lobbying presence in the US. This year Google is the top corporate spender on lobbying in the US, dishing out US$6 million in just three months.
In a letter today to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, three health organisations set out major concerns on the Trans Pacific…
So what happens if Jacinda and David get snookered into having to sign the TPPA?
‘Yesterday’s announcement that the new government has heeded widespread concerns and taken investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) off the table in…
The ISDS provisions of the TPP are the ones permitting foreign investors (a.k.a huge multinational corporations) to sue the New Zealand Government for imposing legislative and/or regulatory restrictions on their existing or proposed investments. Such litigation to occur not in a New Zealand courtroom, in front of a New Zealand judge, but before an international tribunal staffed and adjudicated by the sort of lawyers more usually to be found working for – you guessed it – “huge multinational corporations”.