[All] Fwd: New Report: The CETA Deception - Fighting Harper's myths about free trade

[Norah & Richard]

So sorry I missed getting together with all of you last week at the 
lake. I will get back to GREN in Sept... but this is NB for now.. The 
federal govt has been spreading CETA propaganda since April when Harper 
sent 18 ministers across the country to sell his EU trade deal to the 
masses. "Sell " being the operative word. This new report cuts through
the myths. Good to use with politicians... as another round of CETA 
negotiations gets underway in Brussels.   Norah

**


    *New Report Fights Harper’s CETA Deception
    *http://canadians.org/blog/?p=16152

By Stuart Trew <http://canadians.org/blog/?author=3>, Tuesday, July 
17th, 2012

In April 2012, the Harper government launched a propaganda campaign in 
response to growing criticism 
<http://www.windsorstar.com/business/Tories+launched+cross+country+push+support+trade+deal/6907282/story.html> 
of the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). The 
campaign material, housed on a new DFAIT webpage 
<http://www.international.gc.ca/trade-agreements-accords-commerciaux/agr-acc/eu-ue/can-eu.aspx?view=d>, 
attempts to respond to several claims about CETA which the government 
believes to be myths. Unfortunately, in answering these claims, the 
Harper government introduces even more misleading and even false 
information about the impacts that “next generation” trade agreements 
like CETA will have in a number of social and public policy areas.

Today, the Council of Canadians responded to Harper’s propaganda 
campaign with a new report called The CETA Deception. 
<http://www.windsorstar.com/business/Tories+launched+cross+country+push+support+trade+deal/6907282/story.html> 
In it, we challenge the government’s reassurances that its EU trade deal 
will not affect public health or environmental regulations, will not 
allow foreign corporations to challenge public policy, will not 
undermine public services or municipal democracy, will not increase drug 
prices or hurt Canada’s supports for arts and culture. In each case, the 
government’s position is either misleading or demonstrably false. Click 
here 
<http://www.canadians.org/trade/documents/FightingtheCETAmyths-July2012.pdf> 
to read the report, or click Read more… for our Coles Notes version.

*HARPER SAYS*: CETA will create $12 billion in new wealth and put $1,000 
into the pockets of every working family, which is equivalent to 
creating 80,000 new jobs.

*WE SAY*: The magic $12 billion figure has been seriously discredited 
<http://canada-europe.org/en/pdf/Canada%20in%20for%2012B%20windfall%20with%20EU%20deal.pdf> 
since it made a first appearance in 2008. An independent assessment 
<http://www.eucanada-sia.org/docs/EU-Canada_SIA_Final_Report.pdf> of 
CETA done for the European Commission estimates a GDP boost of between ¼ 
and ½ that amount, or between $3 and $6 billion. But even the lower 
estimate needs to be taken with a grain of salt since the economic 
modelling 
<http://www.policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/National%20Office/2010/10/Out_of_Equilibrium.pdf> 
used to calculate all these numbers assumes full employment, total 
reinvestment of trade gains into new production, and other conditions 
that don’t exist in the real world. In fact, studies have shown 
<http://www.policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/National%20Office/2010/10/Out_of_Equilibrium.pdf> 
that CETA will lead to job losses by increasing Canada’s existing trade 
deficit with EU countries and reinforcing an imbalanced trade 
relationship where we export raw resources to the EU and import 
high-value manufactured goods.

*HARPER SAYS*: Canada’s free trade agreements exclude health care, 
public education and other social services maintained for a public purpose.

*WE SAY*: Public pressure forced the Canadian government to seek better 
protections for health care in the North American Free Trade Agreement 
(NAFTA) but CETA could undermine those protections. As private, 
for-profit activity increases in health care, education and other social 
services, it’s not clear a trade or investment panel would agree that 
these are services “maintained for a public purpose.” As proposed by 
Scott Sinclair 
<http://www.policyalternatives.ca/publications/reports/ceta-and-health-care-reservations>, 
senior trade expert with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 
Canada should negotiate a new exemption, modeled on the cultural 
exemption in Canadian trade deals, which assures that nothing in CETA 
“shall be construed to apply to measures adopted or maintained by a 
party with respect to health care, public health insurance, public 
education and other social services.”

*HARPER SAYS:* Free trade deals like CETA do not prevent governments 
from regulating standards that protect the public, including in the 
areas of the environment, labour, health care and safety.

*WE SAY:* CETA and free trade deals like it are designed specifically to 
limit opportunities for governments to introduce new rules and 
regulations that have an impact on trade and investment flows, even if 
the intention of the rules was to protect the environment or public 
health. The United States has just lost three World Trade Organization 
disputes involving meat labelling, a ban on flavoured cigarettes to 
discourage smoking among children, and voluntary measures designed to 
protect dolphins from tuna fishing. CETA and other trade deals include 
language on avoiding new regulation as the best and least 
trade-distorting option. CETA will provide Canada and the EU with tools 
to frustrate or delay the introduction of new standards. It will give 
corporations the right to sue governments in the event that regulations 
interfere with their profits.

*HARPER SAYS:* Canada’s FTAs do not force governments to privatize, 
contract out or deregulate water-related services.

*WE SAY:* European member states are so concerned about how CETA might 
affect their ability to deliver public water services that they have 
proposed to exclude drinking water from their side of the bargain. With 
only one exception in Yukon, federal government, provinces and 
territories have not asked for the same protection 
<http://cupe.ca/ceta/concerns-ceta-talks-resume-brussels> for water 
services, which leaves Canada’s public water systems vulnerable to 
claims by the EU or its large private water companies that their 
investment opportunities are being undermined either by local water 
monopolies, or, where there is already some level of privatization, by 
new water use or other standards.

*HARPER SAYS:* CETA and free trade deals do not allow foreign investors 
and foreign companies to challenge Canadian laws and regulations.

*WE SAY*: NAFTA’s chapter 11 protections for foreign investors have 
allowed corporations to challenge dozens of Canadian laws and 
regulations simply because they interfere with profits. Canada is the 
sixth most sued country under the investor-state dispute settlement 
regime, which exists in around 3,000 bilateral investment treaties 
globally. Those corporate lawsuits have attacked environmental 
assessments, the failure to get approval for unpopular or 
environmentally dangerous quarries and dumpsites, measures to reduce the 
use of pesticides, research and development payments from offshore oil 
and gas production, the way hunting and fishing licences are 
distributed, and local content quotas in Ontario’s Green Energy Act. 
Canada has had to pay out or is on the hook for over $200 million in 
settlements or losses to investors under these extreme investor rights 
which countries such as Australia are now avoiding in their trade deals.

*HARPER SAYS:* It is a myth that a Canada-EU free trade agreement would 
increase drug and health care costs.

*WE SAY*: It is a certainty that extended patent and other monopoly 
protections for brand name drug companies will increase the price of 
drugs. These controversial changes in CETA’s intellectual property 
rights chapter are estimated to add almost 3.5 years to the time it 
takes to put cheaper generic drugs onto the Canadian market. That means 
public and private drug plans will be paying higher prices for longer, 
adding nearly $3 billion annually to the already inflated price of drugs 
in Canada. Provincial governments are so concerned that they have asked 
the federal government to compensate them in the event that CETA results 
in higher drug prices.

*HARPER SAYS:* It’s a myth that CETA would prevent Canada’s municipal 
governments from sourcing goods and services locally.

*WE SAY:* The procurement rules in CETA will prohibit any covered 
government or public agency from preferring one bidding firm over 
another based on the amount of Canadian or local content in the goods or 
services that firm is offering. Already procurement, or public spending, 
is open and transparent in Canada. Already European firms bid on and win 
major construction and other projects. The only thing CETA does is lock 
municipalities into one way of spending, where the lowest bid wins every 
time. It means giving up the right to use procurement as a sustainable 
development or job creation tool.

*HARPER SAYS:* CETA has been the most open and transparent trade 
negotiation in Canadian history.

*WE SAY: *So why did it take the government three years to try to 
explain the agreement to the public? The fact that the provinces are 
negotiating a trade deal for the first time says nothing about 
transparency since the provinces are being even more tight-lipped than 
the Harper government. There have been and will not be any opportunities 
to see or modify CETA before it is signed, perhaps as early as this 
winter. Once it is signed, the Harper government will block attempts to 
modify it in parliament. This is the antithesis of transparency. If CETA 
and agreements like it are supposed to be 21st century or 
“next-generation” free trade deals, they should be negotiated in 21st 
century ways — openly, transparently, and with broad public input.











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