EU-US TTIP negotiations
Public opposition to controversial investor dispute mechanism cannot be ignored
The European Commission today presented an analysis of the outcome of a public consultation it launched on the controversial investor-state dispute settlement mechanism in the EU-US trade and investment partnership (TTIP). Commenting on the Commission's analysis, Green trade spokesperson Yannick Jadot said:
"The Commission is getting lost in the detail and deliberately ignoring the bigger picture of its consultation on the investor-state dispute settlement mechanism (ISDS). The elephant in the room is that there is clear and overwhelming public opposition to ISDS. Instead, the Commission's analysis of the consultation merely focused on the responses to the more specific questions. This analysis, combined with the superficial transparency steps on TTIP presented by the Commission, show how the Commission is trying to fob-off public concerns and demonstrates a total lack of respect for the public and civil society and their concerns.
"This public opposition cannot be ignored. ISDS has no place in TTIP or EU trade policy in general. It is an opaque procedure, which can and is used by multinational corporations to whittle away EU standards and regulations across a range of policies from the environment to food safety to social protection. The Commission and EU member states should finally acknowledge this and confine ISDS to history.
"Beyond ISDS, the myriad of concerns with the TTIP negotiations and their implications for EU standards and the European public remains. There is a large and growing sense of unease and concern among the European public and civil society about the ongoing TTIP negotiations. This concern reflects the broad scope of the negotiations and their possible implications on European standards (food, health, environment, public services etc.), and is reinforced by the opaque negotiation process. The Greens will continue to fight against these negotiations and an agreement which undermines EU standards and democracy. With the European Parliament now working on a new resolution on the TTIP negotiations, we hope other political groups will join with us to this end."
