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Trade Deals vs. ‘Core Community Values’
Trade Deals vs. ‘Core Community Values’
How a federal ‘no’ to Nova Scotia mine got whacked by NAFTA’s tribunal.
Canada lost a big chunk of its sovereignty as well as its right to protect local communities from bad developments earlier this year in a little reported NAFTA tribunal decision.
Furthermore the appalling ruling has major implications for any community or First Nation opposed to liquefied natural gas terminals, mining projects or bitumen pipelines.
The bizarre Bilcon case also represents a perfect example of why Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provisions, now commonplace in international trade agreements such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, face increasing resistance from citizens around the world.
The investor trade law expert Gus Van Harten has defined the ISDS or new pseudo-courts deftly. Their purpose “is to protect foreign investors, meaning usually the world’s wealthiest companies and people, from the rest of us. Instead of public courts, you now have private lawyers sitting as ‘arbitrators’ with the power to decide how much Canadians must pay to compensate foreign investors for our country’s decisions.”
Last March, a three-man NAFTA tribunal ruled that a federal and provincial environmental review process grossly erred by rejecting a controversial quarry proposed by a Delaware construction company on Digby Point in Nova Scotia.
Tellingly, the ruling can’t be contested under Canadian law.
The dismal facts are these. The Delaware-based firm Bilcon wanted to blast, crush, wash and stockpile millions of tons of rock a year and to build a 170 metre-long marine terminal that would load cargo ships with approximately 40,000 tons of aggregate, every week over a 50-year period.
Lots of Nova Scotians objected to the mining export project on the grounds that it would degrade a precious resource: the beautiful Bay of Fundy.
A joint federal review environmental panel noted that Bilcon didn’t do a very good job talking to First Nations or fishermen either.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
North American Union: US/Canadian Generals Discussed Fully Integrating Their Militaries
North American Union: US/Canadian Generals Discussed Fully Integrating Their Militaries
Ever since the plans for the Trans-Texas Corridor (AKA NAFTA Superhighway) were canceled by the Federal Government and the Texas State Legislature, the theories surrounding the North American Union have largely fallen out of public’s awareness. However, every now and then a story will emerge that suggests that the governments of North America are still quietly conspiring to unite Canada, Mexico, and the US into a superstate, much like the European Union.
The latest revelation of this plan comes from Canada, where it’s been revealed that Chief of the Defence, Staff Gen. Tom Lawson and the former chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey, once discussed a plan to fully integrate the militaries of the US and Canada. On the surface this doesn’t sound too surprising, since these forces have been frequently deployed together overseas in recent years. And under NORAD, the Air Forces of both nations are already operating under the same command structure for the most part.
However, this plan was supposed to allow personnel from all branches of the military, including our special forces, to be deployed together in the same units under a single unified command outside of Canada. The discussion was held in October of 2013, and the documents that prove it were obtained by an Access to Information request, which is essentially the Canadian counterpart to America’s FOIA.
What’s more alarming about this military integration plan, is that General Dempsey and General Lawson seriously discussed this idea without the knowledge of the US or Canadian governments.
Daniel Proussalidis, a spokesman from the defence minister’s office, said in an email to CBC News Monday the document was not presented to the defence minister and the government has not considered its contents.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
TransCanada quietly plots response as Keystone XL rejection seems imminent
Alberta company consulting lawyers on possibly suing U.S. under NAFTA
A source involved in Keystone XL said the main suspense now is how Obama will make his big announcement about the pipeline: quietly, in a mid-summer Friday afternoon statement, or boldly from a platform like his upcoming Aug. 31 trip to a climate-change conference in Alaska. (The Associated Press)
The Canadian company involved in the controversy-plagued Keystone XL project has begun planning its response as indications mount the proposed oil pipeline will be rejected by U.S. President Barack Obama.
In its public statements, TransCanada Corp. is expressing hope Obama might still approve the pipeline, which over the course of its years-long delay has become an irritant between the U.S. and Canadian governments.
The rumour is that the decision to deny has been made, and they’re just waiting for the right time– Source involved in Keystone XL project
But people close to the project say the company has become all but convinced a rejection is imminent based on signals the White House is sending publicly and privately — and it’s now considering the next move.
One possible response is a challenge under the North American Free Trade Agreement to recoup damages from the U.S. government. Another is immediately re-filing a permit application with the U.S. State Department before the 2016 presidential election..
A source involved in the project said the company is consulting lawyers on the mechanics of a NAFTA challenge, and weighing the legal and political implications.
He said the main suspense now is how Obama will make his big announcement — quietly, in a mid-summer Friday afternoon statement, or boldly from a platform like his upcoming Aug. 31 trip to a climate-change conference in Alaska.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Sacred Cows? Nah, Secretive Trade Deals Are Mostly Bull
Sacred Cows? Nah, Secretive Trade Deals Are Mostly Bull
Global pacts like the TPP threaten made-in-Canada system, argue dairy farmers.
[Editor’s note: The 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership, now in advanced stages of negotiation, is ruffling the feathers of Canadian dairy farmers, who worry the agreement will impact the industry’s long-standing “supply management” system that protects farmers from imports. While reports show the U.S. government is pressuring Canada to open up its border to American dairy, the Harper government has only said that it will continue to defend supply management — and is otherwise staying mum on potential concessions. This unsolicited op-ed by the National Farmers Union summarizes farmer fears.]
Trade did not begin when the Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement was originally signed, and neither will it stop if the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is not signed. Trade agreements’ investor protection clauses that enable corporations to force governments to compensate them when social or environmental policy impedes profits are contrary to democratic values. Today, Canada’s supply management system is under attack. Some trading partners, such as New Zealand and the U.S., want to sell their dairy products to Canadians, and lobbyists from other sectors within Canada would like to sacrifice the supply managed sectors as a way to obtain benefits for their own sectors. While agreements like CETA, the TPP and NAFTA are called “trade” deals, they are really sets of rules that limit governments and empower corporations. The corporate sector may make profits the top priority, but for Canadians, it is common sense to guarantee that our people can rely on both the quality and quantity of food produced by our farmers.
Canadians support supply management for good reason. It is an innovative solution, first developed in Ontario and Quebec in the 1960s. Supply management addressed the problems that led to both milk shortages and over-production and waste, along with uncertain, volatile incomes for dairy farmers. Prices were often below the cost of production and at times, processors would turn farmers away.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The TPP, Monsanto, Rockefeller, Trilateral Commission, Brzezinski
The TPP, Monsanto, Rockefeller, Trilateral Commission, Brzezinski
All hands on deck for global, economic, corporate dictatorship
There are dots to connect here. They’re real, and they’re spectacular.
Let me begin with a brief exchange from a 1978 interview, conducted by reporter Jeremiah Novak. He was speaking with two American members of the Trilateral Commission (TC), a group founded in 1973 by David Rockefeller and his intellectual flunkey, Zbigniew Brzezinski.
NOVAK: Yes, but why doesn’t President Carter come out with it and tell the American people that [US] economic and political power is being coordinated by a [Trilateral Commission] committee made up of Henry Owen and six others? After all, if [US] policy is being made on a multinational level, the people should know.
RICHARD COOPER [Trilateral Commission member]: President Carter and Secretary of State Vance have constantly alluded to this in their speeches.
KARL KAISER [Trilateral Commission member]: It just hasn’t become an issue.
Source: “Trilateralism: The Trilateral Commission and Elite Planning for World Management,” ed. by Holly Sklar, 1980. South End Press, Boston. Pages 192-3.
This through-the-looking-glass moment summed up the casual arrogance of Trilateral members: of course US government policy was in the hands of Trilateralists; what else would you expect?
US government policy most certainly covers the area of international trade—and Cooper and Kaiser were foreshadowing blockbuster trade treaties to come: e.g., NAFTA, GATT (which established the World Trade Organization), CAFTA, and now, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which is being negotiated in secret among 12 nations responsible for a major amount of world trade and world GDP.
Here are two key Trilateral quotes that reflect this global outlook—by which I mean a world dominated by mega-corporations:
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Free Trade Deals Put Profits Over Public Interest
Free Trade Deals Put Profits Over Public Interest
‘Poison pill’ strategy ties hands of future governments.
Opponents of so-called free trade deals have always struggled with the question of why these international treaties don’t generate more alarm and vocal opposition from Canadians. These treaties, after all, trump all other Canadian authority to make laws — provincial legislatures, Parliament, the courts and even the Constitution. If, instead of being bored by news of another ho-hum “trade deal,” Canadians were told that a panel of three international trade lawyers would be reviewing all new laws and determining, in secret, which ones passed muster by meeting with the approval of their giant corporate clients, would they react differently?
That is effectively what all of these corporate rights treaties establish: extra-judicial rulings whose objective is to protect the profits against laws passed in the public interest. The clauses that allow such suits are referred to as investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS). This is not hyperbole — that is the actual, stated objective of ISDS: if a new law affects the expected future profits of a foreign owned company, it can sue the federal government for damages. And the decision is made by a panel of trade lawyers whose bias is, naturally, in favour of facilitating corporate interests — because that is who they normally work for. They aren’t environmental lawyers or labour lawyers or human rights lawyers. They’re trade lawyers. Foxes judging the right of other foxes to kill chickens.
Twenty years after NAFTA — the first free trade agreement to include ISDS — came into effect there are many examples of laws duly passed by legislatures in the public interest that have been ruled in violation of NAFTA. Some are more egregious than others — but they all challenge and assign financial penalties against laws that one government or another thought were important enough to implement.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Canada Is Trading Away Its Environmental Rights
Canada Is Trading Away Its Environmental Rights
In 1997, Canada restricted import and transfer of the gasoline additive MMT because it was a suspected neurotoxin that had already been banned in Europe. Ethyl Corp., the U.S. multinational that supplied the chemical, sued the government for $350 million under the North American Free Trade Agreement and won! Canada was forced to repeal the ban, apologize to the company and pay an out-of-court settlement of US$13 million.
The free trade agreement between Canada, the U.S. and Mexico was never designed to raise labour and environmental standards to the highest level. In fact, NAFTA and other trade agreements Canada has signed — including the recent Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement with China — often take labour standards to the lowest denominator while increasing environmental risk. The agreements are more about facilitating corporate flexibility and profit than creating good working conditions and protecting the air, water, land and diverse ecosystems that keep us alive and healthy.
Canada’s environment appears to be taking the brunt of NAFTA-enabled corporate attacks. And when NAFTA environmental-protection provisions do kick in, the government often rejects them.
According to a study by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, more than 70 per cent of NAFTA claims since 2005 have been against Canada, with nine active cases totalling $6 billion outstanding. These challenge “a wide range of government measures that allegedly interfere with the expected profitability of foreign investments,” including the Quebec government’s moratorium on hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
