Saturday 26 July 2014

TTIP could force fracking on Ireland



The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), currently being negotiated between the European Commission and the United States government, could open the door for hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in Ireland.  Yet most people in this country have never heard of TTIP: an unsurprising fact, because the mainstream media has consistently and inexplicably failed to cover the issue since formal talks commenced in Washington over a year ago. 
For those who don’t know, the TTIP, like previous controversial free trade treaties such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), has a highly protectionist agenda: it aims to enhance corporate profits by weakening labour rights and employing stringent deregulation of environmental, health and food safety laws (including current European restrictions on genetically modified crops).  In Britain, all major trade unions are opposed to the TTIP, while fears abound that the inclusion of health and medical services in the treaty will ultimately lead to the permanent privatisation of the NHS.  Ireland can expect a similar fate of mass privatisation, as well as an influx of unlabelled genetically modified crops and ractopamine-fed pork from America.  This will come as no surprise to those aware of the ongoing neoliberal agenda of western governments since the era of Reagan and Thatcher: an agenda which prompted the apt title of Professor Noam Chomsky’s 1999 book Profit Over People. 
However, the most imminent danger posed by the new trade agreement rests in a proposed provision for an Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS).  The inclusion of the ISDS in the new trade agreement would give large multinational corporations the right to sue the government of a host state if a national policy, implemented in the public interest, has a negative impact on company profits.  In other words, state policy introduced by the will of the people can be challenged legally by a corporate investor if the company records profit losses as a result of said policy.  So, should the Irish government decide to ban fracking in the interests of public health and environmental safety, the ISDS would permit a gas company to sue for damages to the tune of millions.  An example of the dangers of such unbridled corporate power can already be seen in Canada, where the gas company Lone Pine Resources is currently using the ISDS as laid out in NAFTA to sue Quebec for $250 million.  The state’s supposed crime was the introduction of a moratorium on fracking, prompted by valid concerns about the risks to public health and environmental safety.
The implementation of an ISDS in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership would represent an EU-wide betrayal of the accepted democratic theory that all eligible citizens should have an equal share in the proposal, development and creation of laws.  Instead, a scenario in which foreign corporate companies can expect to be treated as a domestic firm arises and, as many academics have noted, this would give them rights that far exceed those of an ordinary citizen in political decision-making.  They become, as Chomsky puts it, “immortal,” unimaginably wealthy citizens with power over political decisions: a terrifying concept with far reaching consequences for all European citizens.    
The deadline for public consultation submissions on the TTIP (July 13th) has passed without any coverage by the major broadcasters in this country, leaving the public largely oblivious to the existence of any risk.  Meanwhile comparatively trivial matters like the Garth Brooks concerts dominated the headlines for days.  This fact in itself must raise questions about just how public the consultation was and just how interested the EU commission is in listening to the opinions of the masses.  Power rests, it seems, with the industrial lobbyists in Brussels.