FTA secrecy is against the national interest

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By Leith van Onselen

Greg Wood – a former deputy secretary in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, a former High Commissioner in Canada, and former senior bureaucrat at the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade – has penned an excellent piece in Fairfax today slamming the secrecy surrounding Australia’s free trade agreement (FTA) negotiations and questioning their benefits:

Contradicting [Andrew] Robb’s view on secrecy being normal, DFAT lists 710 “stakeholders” consulted while negotiating the China FTA. They include the Deer Industry Association and the Nursing and Midwifery Board of the Northern Territory. The Australian Parliament isn’t among them, hence nor is the Australian public more generally.

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About the author
Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.