Australian Government Announces Rare Public Consultation On TPP -- Then Bans All Journalists From Attending
from the something-to-hide? dept
As Techdirt has noted many times, the TPP negotiations -- like ACTA before them and now TAFTA/TTIP -- are distinguished by an almost complete lack of transparency. That makes the rare opportunities offered by governments participating in TPP to find out more, particularly valuable and important. Here's one announced recently by the Australian government:
Dear TPP Stakeholders,
As far as it goes, that sounds good. But then something strange happened, as the Pirate Party Australia explained:
As part of the Australian Government's ongoing public consultation process on the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) negotiations, the TPP negotiating team will be visiting Sydney on 30 October 2013 to meet with interested members of the public, and business and civil society stakeholders. The meeting will provide an update on the negotiations and an opportunity for further stakeholder input.Pirate Party Australia has received confirmation that the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) has rescinded confirmations of attendance for journalists to the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement briefing to be held in Sydney at 4pm on 30 October, stating that the meeting is "off-the-record", and that journalists are not welcome.
Not only did the Australian government rescind invitations to journalists, but it also "disappeared" the whole event from its Web site. And it gets even better. Brendan Molloy, Councillor of Pirate Party Australia, is quoted as saying:
"I've already had a freedom of information request have a fee levied with the justification that the TPP isn't in the public interest because there have been few articles written about it. It's pretty hard to write an article about something when you're barred from attending the briefings, and instead offered an arrangement where you're spoonfed Government spin and prevented from hearing the important, unanswered questions being asked by the stakeholders that shine a harsher light on this secretive agreement," concluded Mr Molloy.
In other words, the Australian government refuses to release information about TPP freely, because it says that too few articles have been written about it. And then it bans journalists from attending public meetings, thus making it harder for them to write articles on the subject. Classy.
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Filed Under: australia, journalism, open, tpp, transparency
Reader Comments
The First Word
“The story I'd like to see...
Every time journalists get barred from things like this, which are clearly in the public interest to be informed about, I would like to see a front page story like:Abbott in talks to allow child abduction
Australian PM Tony Abbott has refused to deny speculation that the Australian Government is in talks that would allow foreign nationals the right to freely trade in children sold into slavery.
While the federal Government held a briefing on the current status of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, all journalists have been actively barred from attending the briefing. As a result, we have been unable to verify the status of the controversial measure, which would allow foreign companies the right to protect their investments in Australian children.
When asked to comment, deputy leader Julie Bishop said, "I'm not going to comment on what may or may not be in the agreement."
So far the speculation has been mounting. With silence from the Liberal Government around the current status of the agreement, there are questions surrounding whether some of the measures being discussed are even more potentially sensitive than the proposal to allow the free trading of children a young as 18 months old.
C'mon The Age - you know you really want to!
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When it gets bitch slapped around in public they better take it like big boys and girls.
I am starting to think that what people need is a government map a type of Facegov where every public servant is profiled so people can see what their bias and thus tendencies are and where all this crap is coming from, is not from elected official those are dumb as knobs when it comes to these types of agreements and other aspects of the government.
Tracing the connections is very important for targeting the right places for change, elected officials are proxies they are not the real source of the problems.
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The story I'd like to see...
Abbott in talks to allow child abduction
Australian PM Tony Abbott has refused to deny speculation that the Australian Government is in talks that would allow foreign nationals the right to freely trade in children sold into slavery.
While the federal Government held a briefing on the current status of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, all journalists have been actively barred from attending the briefing. As a result, we have been unable to verify the status of the controversial measure, which would allow foreign companies the right to protect their investments in Australian children.
When asked to comment, deputy leader Julie Bishop said, "I'm not going to comment on what may or may not be in the agreement."
So far the speculation has been mounting. With silence from the Liberal Government around the current status of the agreement, there are questions surrounding whether some of the measures being discussed are even more potentially sensitive than the proposal to allow the free trading of children a young as 18 months old.
C'mon The Age - you know you really want to!
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Re:
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Re: The story I'd like to see...
"Secretive TPP meeting cover for Al-Qaeda terrorist meeting!"
"TPP meeting actually child abuse convention"
Australian PM refuses to talk to the press...
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Re: The story I'd like to see...
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Re: Re: The story I'd like to see...
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Re: Re: The story I'd like to see...
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Amateurs.
Mainstream media has no problems writing extensively about things they know nothing about.
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Re: The story I'd like to see...
It wouldn't even be too out of bounds to assume things like that, they've been tried elsewhere, and the fact that they are so utterly obsessed with keeping everything secret from the public screams louder than words that what they are negotiating is very much not for the benefit of the public.
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I mean, a couple of decades back it would have been easy to spot a reporter, as they'd likely be fairly well known as working for a given news agency, but these days anyone can fill that role, so what, do they plan on kicking out anyone who appears to be recording the lecture*? Are they going to show to the door anyone who appears to be taking notes or asking difficult questions?
*The odds of such an event being anything more than the TPP reps just repeating who awesome the TPP is, and how secrecy is vital to it is slim to none, so it very much won't be a discussion.
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To Ozzies Everywhere
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That one sounds pretty plausible.
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Opacity
Yeah, you know... transparency!
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