The AFR reports today that a revamped Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) mega trade pact, involving 11 of the original signatories (but excluding the US), could be operational within a year:
Both the Australian and Japanese governments, both of which are pushing hardest to revive the TPP, are quietly confident they will receive in-principle support from the 11 other signatories to forge ahead with the TPP at this week’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Vietnam…
In a trade speech in Perth on the weekend, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said Mr Abe’s “resounding re-election” meant “the previously impossible is now achievable”.
He said the TPP-11 would be structured to accommodate a change of heart by the US and to include new entrants, especially China.
“Importantly, if we succeed in securing a TPP-11, then it must be designed to enable the US to dock back when it is ready to do so,” he said…
“Our aim is to create an open architecture that enables any country to join, including China, provided they are willing to meet its high standards.”
Only one of the TPP-11 nations has legislated to enforce the TPP. The government’s best estimate is that it would take up to 12 months to have the TPP-11 in force because the other 10 nations, including Australia, would need to legislate and make other adjustments.
MB has opposed the TPP from the get-go, largely because it includes Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provisions, which opens the door to multinational companies suing the Australian Government for implementing rules against their interests (e.g. on environmental, health and safety grounds), as well as agreed extensions to patent and copyright protections.
Australia’s Productivity Commission (PC) has also been highly critical of such clauses being included in trade agreements, in 2010 noting “that some provisions included in Australia’s recent preferential trade agreements – including investor-state dispute settlement mechanisms, government procurement requirements, intellectual property protections and provisions affecting areas traditionally the province of domestic policy, such as culture -potentially entail significant costs or risks”.
More recently, the PC lamented that Australia’s trade negotiations have been “characterised by a lack of transparent and robust analysis, a vacuum consequently filled at times by misleading claims”, and has called on the “final text of an agreement to be rigorously analysed before signing”.
Similarly, a Parliamentary committee also slammed the lack of adequate “oversight and scrutiny” pertaining to the TPP, and lamented that “parliament is faced with an all-or-nothing choice” on whether or not to approve trade agreements and can only officially review trade laws once they have officially passed.
The original TPP was an incredibly complex agreement whose text numbered some 6,000 pages and 30 chapters. It was far too complex for the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties (JSCOT) to comprehensively review and required expert scrutiny from the PC prior to any parliamentary vote to ratify the agreement.
Australia dodged a bullet when the Trump Administration scuttled the original TPP. Now the Turnbull Government is seeking to sell us out all over again.
