The toxic trade deal between Canada and the EU is set to come into force on Thursday

Date: 19 September 2017

Commenting on the controversial Canada-EU trade deal, CETA, being provisionally implemented on Thursday, Jean Blaylock, a trade campaigner with Global Justice Now said:

“Despite the UK’s intention to leave the EU, the government wants to take the worst aspects of EU trade deals with us. Most of the deal between Canada and the EU, CETA, will come into effect on Thursday, including in the UK. May and Trudeau have now also decided that CETA should be ‘smoothly’ carried over into a cut & paste deal between Canada and the UK.

“CETA is a corporate dominated deal, the purpose of which is to reduce regulation on business. It is likely to lead to a race to the bottom in standards on food safety, environmental regulations and workers’ rights, and it will lock in the privatisation of public services.

“A replicated version of CETA between the UK and Canada would be likely to include the most controversial element – powers for corporations to sue governments for enacting laws and making decisions that might be in the public good, but may impact corporate profit margins. There are numerous examples from similar trade deals where companies have used these powers to challenge labour laws, environmental protections and consumer standards.

“CETA was negotiated in secrecy by the EU and the UK is now doing exactly the same. Theresa May and Liam Fox are gallivanting around the world pushing for trade deals after Brexit that could end up being even worse than this. We’re looking at Liam Fox, one of the cabinet’s biggest proponents of free market extremism, proposing all manner of trade deals, at a time when the UK is desperate to put its name on anything in order to claim economic credibility when it leaves the single market. What’s most terrifying is that this process is happening completely behind closed doors and with almost no parliamentary oversight. It’s urgent that the upcoming Trade Bill addresses these issues.”
Notes

How Brexit will make UK trade deals less democratic and what to do about it
CETA: TTIP’s ugly brother