Author: Willem Wachtmeester

Gisteren ontving ik het bericht van SumOfUs, over het TTIP ‘handelsverdrag’ dat dreigt te worden getekend door de overheden van de EU en de VS. Een verdrag waarin grote bedrijven de macht wordt gegeven, wettelijk genomen beslissingen van democratisch gekozen regeringen, naast zich neer te leggen, door via geheime rechtszaken, die regeringen terecht te wijzen. Lees dit bericht, huiver en teken a.u.b. de petitie (via de link):

Right now, Europe and the USA are negotiating a huge corporate power grab affecting literally millions of European and American citizens.

The Transatlantic Trade & Investment Partnership (or TTIP) is called a “trade treaty”. But if agreed, the TTIP would actually hand corporations the power to overturn democratically decided laws,
on everything from environmental protections to food safety, through a
system of secret courts that only corporations would have access to.

European leaders are already nervous about how the public might react, and are not sure what to do. Under pressure, the EU is about to launch a big public consultation about the proposed system of secret corporate courts — but there’s a real danger that the loudest voices will be the giant corporations that stand to benefit. We don’t have long to prove that it’s people power that counts, not corporate power.

Can you tell European leaders to reject the TTIP and stop the corporate power grab?

The trade deal between Europe and the US wouldn’t be the first one with these sorts of rules. We’re already seeing what this means in practice:

• In Australia, tobacco giant Phillip Morris is suing the government for its tough anti-smoking laws. 
• The German government is being sued by Vattenfall, a Swedish energy giant, for phasing out nuclear power. 
• The pesticide giant, Dow Chemical, were able to sue the Canadian
  government when it tried to stop Dow selling a controversial pesticide. 

The rules about corporations suing government aren’t the only problem
with the trade deal that the EU is negotiating with the US. There are
real worries that it could make life-saving drugs much more expensive,
hand the music industry the power to cut off your internet supply, and
mean an end to rules forcing global airlines to pay up for their
pollution through the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme.

The very fact that Europe has been forced to open up parts of the
deal to public consultation shows that pressure is building, and that
this deal might not pass. The consultation only deals with
“investor-state dispute settlement” — but these are the rules that
allow corporations to sue governments, and are some of the most worrying
parts of the proposed TTIP. We now have a real chance to get some of the worst aspects struck out of the deal for good — and we should grab it, and keep fighting to end this threat to democracy.

Tell Europe’s leaders to reject the TTIP secret courts and stand up for European democracy.

Thanks for all you do,

Martin, Hannah, Paul and the rest of us.