The Canadian Public Health Association wrote to Prime
Minister Jean Chretien and other members of the government
and Parliament on December 4, 1997 in regard to the MAI.
Here is the text of that letter. First, are some excerpts
from that letter. I hope that all concerned Canadians
would read this with care.
....... the draft MAI, and NAFTA, appear to ..... creating
conditions in which investors, based on private economic
interests, can override legislation based on common good
concerns.
....specific policy objectives to achieve these (MAI) goals
require participation and careful deliberation. Canada
enjoys a long history of openness and transparency in such
deliberations.
... the draft MAI, until very recently, was negotiated
without broad public consultation or input.
...nor have provincial or local governments been engaged in
debates or decision-making about the draft MAI.
... before Canada engages in any further negotiations on
the draft MAI,
broad public consultations on the intent and specific
mechanisms of the
MAI should be undertaken.
CPHA is suggesting that Canadian negotiators ensure that
the draft MAI's
dispute-resolution process,.... is transparent and open to
participation
from citizens and civil society groups.
...the draft MAI contains no provisions allowing other
multilateral
agreements on environment, health, labour, and human rights
to take
precedence when conflict arises.
We do not believe the Government of Canada should sign
agreements that
enforce economic practices that benefit the few without
also insisting
that reciprocating agreements for the common good become
enforceable.
Date: Mon, 8 Dec 1997 15:41:43 -0500 (EST)
From: Robin Round <[log in to unmask]>
December 4, 1997
Dear: - Jean Chretien (Prime Minister),
- Allan Rock (Health Minister)
- Lloyd Axworthy (Foreign Affairs)
- Sergio Marchi (International Trade)
- Christine Stewart (Environment)
- All members of the Commons Standing Committee on
Foreign
Affairs and International Trade, Beth Phinney
(Chair,Standing
Committee on Health).
- Leaders of opposition parties
On behalf of Dr. John Hastings, President of the Canadian
Public Health
Association (CPHA), and the membership of the Association,
I am writing
to you to express the Association's concerns that if Canada
signs the
proposed Multilateral Agreement on Investments (MAI), at
least as
currently drafted, the health and well-being of Canadians
may be
seriously jeopardized. Specifically, CPHA is concerned
about the content
of the draft MAI as well as the current process of
discussion in Canada
in relation to this topic.
At the Canadian Public Health Association's Annual General
Meeting held
in Halifax, July 1997, the members of the Association
approved a
resolution on Promoting Health in an Era of Global Free
Trade (copy
enclosed with this letter). At the CPHA Board of Directors
Meeting held
in October 1997, the Board discussed what action CPHA
should take with
regard to World Trade and the draft MAI. The Board agreed
to undertake
action that would inform political leaders of the
Association's concerns
about World Trade and draft MAI, and contribute to an
ongoing awareness
program for the general public and membership through a
commentary to be
published in the Canadian Journal of Public Health. This
commentary is
being prepared by Dr. Ron Labonte, CPHA Board
Member-at-Large
responsible for the strategic area of health promotion.
While CPHA supports, in principle, the establishment of
international
legal frameworks for investment and trade, we are concerned
that these
agreements, including the draft MAI, presently favour the
rights of
investors and corporations over those of individual
citizens and the
larger public. We urge the government not to proceed
further with
negotiations on the draft MAI until the agreement has been
subject to
more rigorous analyses in terms of health, environmental
and social
equity impacts, and broad-based public hearings have been
conducted.
I would like to take this opportunity to detail some of the
Association's concerns.
The CPHA position on the draft MAI and other
trade/investment agreements
is founded on the following four points:
1. Strong research evidence that relative equality in
wealth or income
distribution within nations is the strongest predictor
of overall
public, or population, health. Some of this research
was
commissioned by the Government of Canada and was
presented earlier
this year to the Canadian Parliament in the Final Report
of the
National Forum on Health.
2. Strong research evidence that the ecological effects of
economic
growth, including greenhouse gas emissions/climate
change,
deforestation, loss of agricultural land, depletion of
food
resources, desertification and toxic emissions, will
have profound
and devastating effects on human health.
3. Historical evidence that legislative and policy
interventions by
national and sub-national governments, whether in the
form of
restrictions or incentives, are necessary to balance
market forces so
that goals related to social equity and environmental
sustainability
can be achieved.
4. The importance, both on public health and democratic
principles, of
open, transparent and participatory approaches to the
resolution of
complex policy issues in which social equity and
environmental
sustainability goals may conflict with economic
development goals.
CPHA is concerned that current trade and investment
agreements, such as
NAFTA and the draft MAI, may weaken the ability of national
and
sub-national governments' to pursue social equity and
environmental
sustainability, and that they have been negotiated with
limited public
input and that they create undemocratic dispute resolution
processes.
CPHA has three specific concerns with the draft MAI:
1. Compensatory Rights of Private Investors and
Corporations...........
The draft MAI, like NAFTA, gives private corporations the
right to claim
compensation from sovereign states for existing and future
laws that
have the "effect" of expropriating their existing and
future profits.
This could cost governments enormous amounts in preparing
arguments
against such suits, further eroding the capital base
available for
programs aimed at increasing social equity or environmental
protection.
It could also establish a climate in which governments will
be less
likely to pursue such objectives for fear of potential
corporate
compensatory claims. While individuals, including
individual investors,
should be protected from investor-government legal
standing, the
provisions of the draft MAI, and NAFTA, appear to go beyond
this
protection by creating conditions in which investors, based
on private
economic interests, can override legislation based on
common good
concerns. Canadian negotiators should insist that
investor-government
legal standing provisions not be in the draft MAI until the
following
conditions are met:
* There is clear language that private economic interests
cannot
override or challenge social and economic policies
enacted by
democratic governments to increase social equity and
environmental
sustainability.
* Proponents of investor-government legal standing
provisions
demonstrate how existing national law and jurisprudence
fail to
protect investors from capricious or undemocratic
expropriation.
2. Undemocratic Dispute Resolution
Process..........................
In 1996, CPHA released an Action Statement on Health
Promotion in
Canada, based on the concerns of public health workers and
their
constituent communities across the country. This statement
contains a
number of democratic, ethical principles, including the
following two
that bear directly on the draft MAI:
* Individual liberties are respected, but priority is given
to the
common good when conflict arises.
* Participation is supported in policy decision-making to
identify what
constitutes the common good.
We recognize that, while it is fundamental to human health
that
governments attain social equity and environmental
sustainability goals,
the more specific policy objectives to achieve these goals
require
participation and careful deliberation. Canada enjoys a
long history of
openness and transparency in such deliberations. Various
public
programs have also supported, directly or indirectly, the
participation
of less powerful social groups in consultations and
discussions on
public policy. Openness, transparency and accountability by
institutions
are the only means by which we can claim to be a democratic
society.
Yet these are precisely what are absent in the
dispute-resolution
measures of global trade and investment agreements.
Moreover, the draft
MAI, until very recently, was negotiated without broad
public
consultation or input.
CPHA is suggesting that Canadian negotiators ensure that
the draft MAI's
dispute-resolution process, whether government-government
or
investor-government, is transparent and open to
participation from
citizens and civil society groups. However, before Canada
engages in any
further negotiations on the draft MAI, broad public
consultations on the
intent and specific mechanisms of the MAI should be
undertaken. The
Government of Canada should also initiate steps to ensure
that
transparency and public participation are extended to
dispute-resolution
procedures in existing agreements, such as the WTO and
NAFTA.
3. Threats to Existing Social Equity and Environmental
Sustainability
Policies....................................................
......
The draft MAI fails to protect existing policies on social
equity and
environmental sustainability, in two ways.
* First, many social and environmental policies are now
under the
jurisdiction of provinces and municipalities. It is also
at these
levels that social and environmental performance
requirements on
investment are most likely to be found, and to be
enforced. The U.S.
federal government, concerned that the draft MAI would
infringe on
state and local government sovereignty, has filed
reservations that
would exempt their laws from MAI obligations. To our
knowledge, as
of this date, the Canadian government has not done this,
nor have
provincial or local governments been engaged in debates
or
decision-making about the draft MAI.
Until provincial and local governments become fully
engaged in MAI
debates, including negotiations of the Government of
Canada's position
on the draft MAI, Canadian negotiators should ensure that
these levels
of government are exempted from MAI obligations.
* Second, the draft MAI contains no provisions allowing
other
multilateral agreements on environment, health, labour,
and human
rights to take precedence when conflict arises. NAFTA,
at least,
allows seven international environment-related agreements
to take
precedence. The draft MAI allows governments,
"notwithstanding" any
other MAI obligations, to take "prudential measures" to
protect the
interests of investors and depositors in financial
services, but no
similar "notwithstanding" clauses are granted for the
protection of
ecosystem integrity and stability, or movement in the
direction of
social equity.
At a minimum, Canadian negotiators should ensure that the
draft MAI
contain "notwithstanding" clauses for social equity and
environmental
stability, specifically exempting governments from MAI
obligations if
these obligations imperil social policies and programs
that improve
social equity.
The latter point raises a contradiction in Canada's (and
most other
nations') current approach to multilateral agreements that
we find
ethically untenable. Canada, like many other nations, is
signatory to
numerous international and multilateral agreements on
environmental
protection and sustainability (e.g., the Rio Declaration,
Agenda 21),
human rights (e.g., the Convention on the Rights of the
Child, the
International Labour Code) and public health (e.g., the
Alma Ata
Declaration, the World Health Assembly Declaration on
Health For All).
These "common good" accords represent agreements about what
is important
to promote and protect if people are to have a decent
quality of life.
None of these agreements have enforcement mechanisms.
Moreover, despite
the effectiveness of the threat of trade sanction penalties
in the
Montreal Protocol on Ozone-Depleting Substances in gaining
rapid
national compliance, Canada's current position on the Kyoto
climate-change negotiations are that trade sanctions or
fines should
not be used as a compliance measure.
In contrast to these "common good" agreements, the draft
MAI, the WTO
and NAFTA, which extend the rights of private investors and
producers
even when they conflict with the "common good", all have
enforcement
measures. We see no ethical justification for this. We do
not believe
the Government of Canada should sign agreements that
enforce economic
practices that benefit the few without also insisting that
reciprocating agreements for the common good become
enforceable.
One proposal gaining support among international
development and public
interest groups globally, and which we support, is the
gradual inclusion
of multilateral "common good" agreements, such as Agenda 21
and the
International Labour Code, as "social clauses" within trade
and investment
agreements. While UN agencies currently responsible for
monitoring such
agreements would continue in that role, they would have at
their disposal
the trade sanction and other enforcement mechanisms of WTO
and other
multilateral trade and investment agreements. There is
agreement among
those concerned with this issue that there are problems
with the
simplistic adoption of "social clauses" within such
agreements,
particularly how to prevent these clauses from becoming
first world
protectionism against exports from low-wage, poorer
countries, but these
are technical problems that we believe can be resolved.
The gradual
inclusion of "social clauses" in trade/investment
agreements, alongside
other progressive international accords, is essential to
ensuring the
health and well-being of Canadians, as well as that of
other people
around the globe.
CPHA is a national, voluntary organization representing
public health in
Canada with strong links to the international public health
community.
CPHA's multidisciplinary membership believe in universal
and equitable
access to the basic conditions which are necessary to
achieve health for
all Canadians. Representatives from this Association would
welcome the
opportunity to participate in meetings with you or your
representatives
to discuss how governments and NGOs could explore the
"social clause"
initiative in further detail. In addition, CPHA is prepared
to discuss
providing support to the Government of Canada in
establishing a position
on future trade and investment negotiations that
accommodates the need
for reciprocating and enforceable health, environment, and
human rights
accords.
I look forward to your response on this important issue of
promoting
health in an era of global free trade.
Yours sincerely,
Gerald H. Dafoe
Chief Executive Officer
Janet MacLachlan, Assistant Executive Director Management
Canadian Public Health Association
PH: (613) 725-3769 FAX: (613) 725-9826
Email: [log in to unmask]
Ronald Labonte, PhD
Communitas Consulting
29 Jorene Drive
Kingston, Ontario, Canada K7M 3X5
(voice): 613-634-7396
(fax): 613-634-2384
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
===================================================
Halifax Initiative d'Halifax
#412-1 Nicholas St.
Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA
K1N 7B7
Telephone: (613) 241-4611
Fax: (613) 241-2292
Email: [log in to unmask]
http://www.sierraclub.ca/national/halifax
.........................................
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and
links to other MAI sites please see
http://www.flora.org/mai-not/
***************************************************
From new transmitters came the old stupidities.
Wisdom was passed on from mouth to mouth.
-Bertolt Brecht
***************************************************
Dennis Raphael, Ph.D.
Associate Professor and Acting Director,
Masters of Health Science Program in Health Promotion
Department of Public Health Sciences
Graduate Department of Community Health
University of Toronto
McMurrich Building, Room 101
Toronto, Ontario, CANADA M5S 1A8
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