Canadian Government Refuses To Release Any Text Of CETA, While Claiming It's Mostly Finished
from the something-to-hide? dept
Back in November, we reported that the EU and Canada were claiming that "a political agreement" on the key elements of the Canada-EU trade agreement, CETA, had been reached. One of the supposed reasons why the negotiations were being conducted in secret was that it was "obviously" not possible to release texts while talks were still going on -- even though that is precisely how WIPO operates. So, now that key parts of the CETA have been agreed upon, presumably the public will finally get to see at least those sections of the text, right? Apparently not, as the Council of Canadians found when it put in a freedom of information request to the Canadian government:
The federal government has denied an access to information request from the Council of Canadians for the working text of the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). The grassroots public advocacy organization is accusing the Conservative government of unnecessarily depriving Canadians of the information they need to pass judgement on CETA, and of any opportunity to alter the deal before it is signed.
This exposes nicely the dishonesty of governments around the world when they claim that regrettably they "have" to keep texts secret, but will release them just as soon as they can. Here, we have major parts of CETA that have been agreed upon and where there is no need to keep them secret -- apart, that is, from the real reason why there is no transparency: because the governments concerned know that once the public find out how they have been let down by their representatives, there will be widespread outrage. In a blatant attempt to stifle democratic debate, it has become standard practice with these trade agreements only to release the texts after they have been passed, and there's nothing that can be done about it.
"It's a new year, but we're seeing the same old secrecy from the Harper government. How is anyone expected to say yes or no to this EU deal if Ottawa is not prepared to release it publicly before CETA is signed, sealed and delivered?" asks Stuart Trew, trade campaigner with the Council of Canadians. "The Prime Minister is misleading Canadians by claiming the CETA negotiations are the most transparent in Canadian history. A fully redacted copy of the text would be more transparent than this."
As the Council of Canadians' trade campaigner points out:
"It is not OK to negotiate sweeping corporate rights deals like CETA behind closed doors and then to deny the public or parliament the opportunity to change anything about them before the deals are signed and passed into law," says Trew. "If the government is so proud of this deal they should gladly present it to Canadians for their approval before signing. Otherwise, the Conservatives could find CETA backfiring for them at election time."
That's certainly how it should work, but among the general public, awareness about the important knock-on consequences of agreements like CETA, TPP and TAFTA/TTIP remains low. And that's how the governments involved aim to keep it, not least by avoiding at all stages any kind of real transparency.
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Filed Under: canada, ceta, europe, stephen harper, tafta, tpp, trade agreements, transparency, ttip
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nice post
HOTSPOT SHIELD PRO
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Keep it secret
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Simple as usual:
And as usual, that 'not free trade agreemant at all' would cause some of our politicans to ATTEMPT to think liiittle farther than just for next elections.
You get the picture already?
Attempting to force Canadians to follow EU's 'citizen represantives'- pff, lets try again, shortsighted politicans waiting on a row for next set of reward-jobs. Or just call it Revolving Door Syndrome.
And of course there will be clause that indicates that Canucks MUST, repeat Must follow insane copyright laws/ treaties that 'Your Southern Friends' lobbyist want, and happily use their Embassies to corrupt Your Goverments as badly as they have done previously on EU.
Examples: Sweden, Great Britain, Finland, France, Germany.
Funny with this Internetisajusttubes-thingy is that even citizens can learn what the _UCK their represantives are ACTUALLY doing =)
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if citizens do not make governments pay at election time, if nothing is done beforehand, then they deserve to be dictated to! also remember most of these governments are Conservative whose political backbone always comes from those they are trying to help the most, as usual and they are the rich, the powerful corporations and industries that do whatever it takes to keep the rich, rich and the poor paying for it!!
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TREASON
im getting real damn angry lately
real damn angry
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Re: TREASON
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IS the Canadian Government going to overthrow the Canadian Government, watch out, your getting real damn angry lately. (just you don't know why)..
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@8
B) the public pays them to make the deal thus the copyright for the crown has been paid
C) VERY CLOSE TO TREASON this type a crap is VERY....IF YOU refuse to disclose a deal that harms me and others of my nation while gaining nothing i wold argue you are in fact deliberately committing an act of treason ....perhaps even HIGH TREASON....and i think that's one offense in Canada you get life with no parole for and that would be if you ever make it that long
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"Bridge builders refuse to release bridge for public use, while claiming it is mostly finished."
"TD refused to release article on WEB, while claiming it is mostly finished"
"Universal movies refuse to release movie to public, while claiming it is MOSTLY finished."
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Sneaky trade agreements with dodgy investor-state relations clauses, however, can force a country to change its laws so polluters can get away with it. See Ecuador V Chevron for what happens when a corporation tells a sovereign state to get bent.
Try again.
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Equating trade agreement negotiations with building physical things is baloney. They are not even close to being equivalent, so using them for an analogy is incorrect.
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Dude, your analogies comparing physical objects with negotiations are lame.
If you really need some sort of analogy, try this:
You are purchasing a house, but you are not allowed know what property you are buying, the purchase price, the interest rate of the loan or the amount of closing costs until you finish signing the papers.
Not a really a smart idea, is it?
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#analogyfail
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Oh I'm sorry.
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WTF?
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