Top secret: The Australian government's GATS negotiations

It's time for a Senate inquiry into the GATS

Craig Emerson on the WTO, the GATS & relations with Asia.

East is East and West is Best

A triumph of prejudice over policy

By Craig Emerson

Any government could expect anti-globalisation protesters to be out in force at the 14-15 November meeting of Trade Ministers. But the Howard government's arrogance in its handling of negotiations under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is confirming the worst fears of the reasonable while playing into the hands of the unreasonable.

Requests have been made of the Howard government by other countries to open up our services markets to foreign suppliers. The government will make offers to open our markets in return. But these requests and offers are secret. Departmental officials have confirmed to us that there are no plans to make them public before the current round of negotiations is completed.

As Labor's Shadow Trade Minister I despair at the damage the government is doing to the cause of trade liberalisation through its handling of the GATS and its pursuit of discriminatory bilateral trade deals.

Properly handled, opening up markets to international trade boosts living standards at home and abroad. But Labor recognises that, while the community at large gains from trade, some of its citizens and their families lose. Labor's industry plans have included compensation provisions for those who have borne the brunt of trade-liberalising policies. Quite possibly, Labor has not gotten all its trade-liberalising plans right in terms of properly compensating the vulnerable and giving them the skills for a new working life. But we have tried ...

... Labor sees new opportunities for creating high-quality Australian jobs through the opening up of overseas markets for Australian service providers under the GATS. At the same time, Labor is committed to ensuring that Australia does not relinquish control of the nation's public institutions, such as our health and education services, in GATS negotiations. We will monitor developments in the GATS negotiations to ensure that the safeguards and assurances given by the WTO are honoured and are effective in maintaining Australia's national interest.

Labor reaffirms its in-principle support for the liberalisation of trade in services. But we will not support governmental services - services provided by governments on a non-competitive and non-commercial basis - being included within the GATS.

Labor will not support any changes that undermine affordable access of Australians to essential public services or any restriction on a country's right to operate whatever universal service obligation they deem necessary on social, regional and other policy grounds.

We will not support any proposals that undermine the public provision of health and education services, and we will not support any Australian government offers under the GATS that would require the privatisation of public assets.

Labor would oppose any future proposal that a WTO Member country be compelled to make any changes to its services regime that it is not prepared to concede voluntarily. And we would oppose any restriction on the right of governments to regulate and to introduce new regulations, on the supply of services. Labor supports open community involvement in Australia's position on the GATS negotiations and insists that the Australian government's requests and offers in the present GATS negotiations be made public, allowing ample time for public consultation and debate.

The Howard government has ignored the lessons of Seattle. Instead of advocating the benefits of properly managed trade liberalisation, it is thumbing its nose at the anti-globalisation movement and at all Australians concerned with the impact of trade liberalisation on their livelihoods.

In view of the government's unwillingness to take the community into its confidence in its GATS negotiations I announce today that Labor will be pushing for a Senate inquiry into the GATS. In doing so, the anti-globalisation movement in Australia should not take heart. I am not in the cart for closing down trade and condemning the poor of the world to ongoing poverty. But I do believe the Australian people have a right to be informed about the GATS negotiations and to have a say in the outcomes.

More than a year ago the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties tabled a report, Who's Afraid of the WTO? Among its many useful recommendations, the committee urged the government to establish an office of trade advocate. Senator Joseph Ludwig, whose idea this was, tells me he based it on the ambassador for the environment established by the previous Labor government. But unlike the ambassador for the environment, who was given an international commission, the trade advocate would operate here in Australia, educating the community about trade liberalisation and the WTO. This good idea was ignored in the government's response tabled almost a year later. If the government were serious about bringing the community with it on trade liberalisation it would reconsider and appoint a trade advocate.

But the government is not interested in bringing the Australian people with it in its half-hearted pursuit of trade liberalisation. By turning its face to the United States and its back to Asia, the government seeks to secure the support of the Australian people at the next election in a world wracked with fear.

Or maybe the Prime Minister hasn't changed his spots: he just doesn't like Asians.

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