Leaders from the BlueGreen Alliance and its allies discussed four ways in which the Trans-Pacific Partnership falls short at a press teleconference yesterday.
Leaders from the BlueGreen Alliance – a national partnership of labor unions and environmental organizations – and its allies held a press teleconference yesterday to discuss why they believe Congress should vote “no” on the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative last Thursday released the full text of the TPP, a massive free trade agreement that was negotiated in secret and signed by a dozen countries in Asia and the Americas last month. Members of the TPP include – the United States, Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam.
The agreement falls short in four key areas including the risk it will impose on American manufacturing jobs, the Investor-State Dispute System, labor standards and environmental standards, BlueGreen Alliance Executive Director Kim Glas said in a statement.
The TPP undermines the U.S. manufacturing sector, will move good-paying American jobs overseas, and would reward large corporations that have moved or plan to move U.S. factories to low-wage, low-standard TPP countries, according to United Steelworkers International President Leo W. Gerard.
“The TPP is a corporate rights agreement. It is neither innovative nor ground breaking except in its efforts to expand monopoly rights to pharmaceutical companies and to expand power and influence to foreign investors,” AFL-CIO Trade Policy Specialist Celeste Drake said in a statement.
Outsourcing to other countries is likely to be spurred by the agreement’s lack of climate change provisions if the United States actually implements the climate deal it made with China, Drake said.
In addition, the TPP’s lack of any currency provision is likely to further promote outsourcing, according to Drake, increasing profits to outsourcers who then export goods back to the United States.
Currency manipulation cannot be enforced under the TPP despite member countries Vietnam, Japan, Malaysia and Singapore having all engaged in the practice to some extent in the past, said Gerhard.
An additional concern addressed was the TPP’s Investor-State Dispute System (ISDS) mechanism, which could give an unelected tribunal the ability to veto U.S. environmental and labor laws at the behest of corporations, United Steelworkers said.
“Corporations have been using the dangerous investor-state dispute settlement process to attack common-sense air, water, and climate protections for years. The TPP would only make a bad situation worse, expanding this system to thousands of new corporations for the first time ever,” Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said in a statement. “The TPP is a toxic deal for American families. We can’t afford to trade away our ability to protect workers and communities, our environment, and our climate.”
Arguers against the TPP also believe the agreement falls short on labor standards, not doing enough for human rights in other countries.
The TPP puts forth vague labor standards, Drake said. The labor chapter’s site agreements do not go beyond the basic promises in the chapter and simply list actions that Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam need to take in order to bring their laws into basic compliance. It does not contain anything on measuring the implementation or enforcement of those legal changes, Drake explained.
In addition, the TPP gives Vietnam a free ride to not enforce freedom of association as directed by international labor standards for a minimum of five years, added Drake.
Vietnam does not recognize free and independent unions, Brunei does not allow unions and Malaysia still has forced labor, Gerard said.
In addition, environmental standards were discussed at the teleconference yesterday.
China wants to ship $100 billion in auto parts into the U.S. market, said Gerard, but steel auto parts produced in non-U.S. member countries can be harmful to the environment since the U.S. has one of the cleanest field industries on the planet.
“This trade agreement would allow foreign corporations to challenge our health, safety and environmental protections in a foreign tribunal outside our legal system, and it would weaken those bedrock safeguards in the United States,” Natural Resources Defense Council International Program Director Jake Schmidt said. “While there are some positive conservation measures, the agreement’s substantial shortcomings should lead Congress to reject it.”
Although many organizations have spoken out against the TPP, supporters, including the Obama administration, have argued the agreement will reduce or eliminate tariffs for U.S.-produced goods including – agricultural products, automotive parts, building products, chemicals, consumer goods, fish, footwear, forest products, high-tech instruments, health products, infrastructure materials, information technology, metals and ores, machinery products, minerals and fuels, and textiles – imported into the TPP countries.
Labor, environmental organizations speak out against TPP
