This framework agreement is not a legally binding trade agreement, but is a framework required as a legally binding instrument by the EU in order to assess whether potential trade agreement partners share EU values, before commencing formal free trade agreement negotiations. It deals with a wide range of issues in addition to trade agreements. The JSCOT inquiry submissions closed on April 20 and the committee is due to report on August 22. The AFTINET full submission will be available on our website after it is released for publication by the joint committee.

The AFTINET submission to the Peru-Australia Free Trade Agreement is summarised below. The JSCOT report is due on August 22, after which Parliament will consider the implementing legislation.  Our assessment is there is insufficient information for support the implementing legislation. The AFTINET full submission will be available on our website after it is released for publication by the joint committee.

Relationship between PAFTA and the TPP-11

April 23, 2018: ANU academic Dr Kyla Tienhaara has published research  in the Journal Transnational Environmental Law showing that mining and energy industries are the most frequent users of Investor-State Dispute Settlement mechanisms heard by the International Centre for the Settlement of Investor Disputes (ICSID), one of the two main tribunal systems that hear ISDS disputes. This poses a threat to effective measures to rapidly reduce carbon emissions.

20 April, 2018: Colombia’s decision to ban mining activities in the Páramos, a range of environmentally sensitive wetlands that provide approximately 70% of the country’s water supply, has so far led to three treaty-based arbitration cases from three different mining investors, under the Canada-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.

April 17, 2018: In a communication to other WTO members on April 12, the US government has outlined its seven areas for a possible WTO work program on e-commerce.

Media Release, April 13: " US President Trump’s announcement that he will renegotiate what is now the TPP-11 exposes the dodgy nature of the deal. The remaining 11 countries reached agreement on the basis that bad provisions sponsored by the US are identified as unacceptable but are only suspended and remain in the deal, and could be reactivated if the US re-joined,” AFTINET Convener Dr Patricia Ranald said today.

April 10, 2018: Sydney University academics Stephen Clibborn and Chris Wright argue in the SMH today that from the 1940s to the 1990s, Australia’s permanent immigration program and strongly enforced labour standards protected the workplace rights of permanent migrants.