22 January 2018: A report published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) last week has revealed that Canada has paid out nearly $220 million in losses under the NAFTA investor-state dispute settlement mechanism (ISDS), and $95 million in legal fees defending against ISDS claims.
January 19, 2018: A new report by Greenpeace, Justice for People and Planet, uses 20 case studies of global corporations to explain how corporate power is being used to violate human rights and environmental rights. The report argues that governments should adopt 10 Principles for Corporate Accountability to curb ‘corporate capture, collusion and impunity’.
January 16, 2018: Bloomberg reports that Japan’s income from monopolies on brands, patents (including medicines) and copyright has jumped by 74% over the past five years to a record high. That is why Japan has replaced the US as the major champion of stronger medicine and copyright monopolies in the TPP-11 and RCEP negotiations.
January 11, 2018: Kate Lappin, regional coordinator of the Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development, has written an article explaining how trade and investment agreements like the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) can deepen gendered inequality and exploitation.
10 January 2018: As the remaining 11 members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (now rebranded the ‘Comprehensive Progressive Agreement for Trans Pacific Partnership’) struggle to reach agreement, some strange reports are appearing in the media.
The Financial Times has reported that the Department for International Trade in the UK has held informal talks about joining the TPP. The UK cannot sign trade deals until it leaves the EU after Brexit, in March 2019.
January 9, 2018: A working group of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) recently held talks to discuss current concerns about the investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) scheme, and possible reforms. UNICTRAL is one of the two bodies which provides panels of investment law arbitrators for ISDS disputes.
December 21, 2017: The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) has warned that the attempt to revive Trans-Pacific Partnership without the US would still lead to increased numbers of vulnerable temporary migrant workers from at least six countries outside of Australia.
6 December, 2017: Professor Jomo Kwame Sundaram, a former UN Assistant Secretary-General and co-author of this critical study measuring the employment costs of the original TPP, has written an article debunking some of the main myths about the newly named Comprehensive Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTTP).
November 28, 2017: The Turnbull government is trying to revive the TPP and retain many of the worst US-initiated clauses. The TPP-11 leaders have not met their deadline to finalise the text, but at the latest round of negotiations they salvaged a possible deal. The agreement has been rebranded the ' Comprehensive and Progressive TPP', and some of its most controversial clauses have been suspended, pending the US rejoining the agreement. The negotiations will continue in 2018.
November 23, 2017: GetUp! has produced a video about the zombie TPP – ‘now back from the dead.’
The TPP-11 talks have only been salvaged by an agreement to rename the deal, suspend some of its most controversial clauses and to have further talks over several months on issues raised by Canada and other governments.
It’s not a done deal yet. But as the video explains –