1. Louise Southalan starts work and drafts GATS submission circulated to members
2. GATS campaigners score victory on EU health, education and broadcasting, but condemn EU on postal, environmental and other services
3. US Government stalls on access to medicines for developing countries
4. US Service Industry demands in the US-Australia Free Trade Agreement

1. Louise Southalan starts work and drafts GATS submission circulated to members

Louise Southalan was the successful applicant for the advertised part time position to work on GATS and the USFTA. Her position is funded through grants from the Sisters of Charity, UnitingCare NSW.ACT, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and the Australian Education Union. She has started work and can be contacted at the email address above. She has produced a draft AFTINET submission on the government GATS discussion paper which has been circulated to AFTINET members for comment. The submission will be finalised by the deadline of March 24 and made available on the website.

The government discussion paper is available on the DFAT website at www.dfat.gov.au/trade/negotiations/services

Please note that on February 12 DFAT released its White Paper "Advancing the National Interest" which is relevant to the submission. The White Paper is available from the DFAT website (www.dfat.gov.au).We will be making reference to the White Paper in the finalised submission.

Submissions on the DFAT discussion paper are invited by 24 February 2003, to The Director, Services Trade Negotiations, Office of Trade Negotiations, Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade, Barton, ACT 0221 or by e-mail to: services.negotiations@dfat.gov.au

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2. GATS campaigners score victory on EU health, education and broadcasting, but condemn EU on postal, environmental and other services

From World Development Movement, Britain.

European GATS campaigners scored a partial victory yesterday when European Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy announced that the European Commission would not further commit Europe's health and education sectors to the free market rules of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) and that no commitments at all would be made in audio-visual (broadcasting) services.

However, campaigners are furious that under the cover of the announcement the EC released its intention to further open EU postal, environmental, telecommunications, distribution (retail), transport and financial services to foreign competition. The announcement, described by campaigners as a "tactical retreat", was made just days before a European demonstration against GATS in Brussels on Sunday February 9.

EC officials admitted the move was a result of the campaign on GATS waged across Europe. Director of the London based international development campaign, The World Development Movement (WDM), Barry Coates today said: "This climb down by the EC is a massive vindication of our campaigning on GATS over the last three years. WDM and a growing coalition of social campaigns, trade unions and local authorities have warned of the dangers of GATS for delivery of affordable, accountable public services around the world. Three years ago the UK Government were claiming that GATS didn't even cover health and education. This is an admission that our concerns about the public policy implications were entirely justified.

"But the victory must be put in context. European countries, including the UK have already made extensive commitments to GATS free market rules in the health and education sectors and these are effectively irreversible. Also this announcement is at the most a temporary stay of execution for these sectors as the GATS treaty forces countries to engage in successive rounds of negotiations offering more sectors each time.

"Pascal Lamy's announcement has been targeted to try and defuse the strong public campaign in Europe to halt GATS. This is a tactical retreat to draw fire away from the EC's main objective, which is to aggressively seek to open up overseas markets for EU service corporations. This is a victory for our members but our campaign continues and at this crucial point in negotiations it is more important than ever.

"Pascal Lamy said nothing about the extensive demands we know the EC is preparing to make of developing countries. This is our greatest concern. It is hypocritical that details of these have been kept secret." The EC revealed that it has received only one demand for opening up of its services from a least developed country (Mali).

Barry Coates said "This exposes the myth that these negotiations are part of what the UK Government insists on calling a 'Development Round' of trade negotiations. Developing countries realise they have little to gain. It is unacceptable that the EC is aggressively targeting basic services in poorer countries while recognising the dangers at home. The EC must withdraw its demands for liberalisation of basic services in developing countries."

On December 23rd eight UK General Secretaries, including those of Unison, TGWU, CWU and NATFHE wrote a public letter to the Guardian expressing their concern about the impact of GATS on health, education, transport, broadcasting and postal services. They called for a halt to GATS negotiations, describing them as "reckless and undemocratic", and arguing "the EC's aggressive requests of the developing countries would adversely impact on workers and vital services for the poor in developing countries."

The EC's press release (IP/03/186) is available on its website.

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3. US Government stalls on access to medicines for developing countries

Summarised from the Washington Trade Daily and the Wall St Journal, 5/2/03

Geneva – Key developing countries issued the strongest warning yet yesterday over the growing danger that this September's Cancun ministerial meeting will end in an impasse if their core development issues – Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights/Public Health, Implementation concerns and Special and Differential Treatment provisions – are not speedily resolved.

Brazil, Indonesia, Kenya and India – along with several other developing countries – said there is only disappointment for them so far in the negotiations because industrialised countries have failed to deliver on the "development" mandate of the Doha Development Agenda set in late 2001. "Unfortunately, so far the Doha Development Agenda has been little more than an empty slogan," commented Clodoaldo Hugueney – a senior Brazilian trade official. Indonesia said there has been no "significant progress" on the proposals submitted by developing and least developed countries. The African countries were angry that they received a "raw deal" on the TRIPS/Public Health issue, saying they are not willing to return to the negotiations which collapsed in December.

During a daylong meeting of the Trade Negotiations Committee – which split into formal and informal sessions – TNC Chairman Supachai Panitchpakdi admitted that progress in the Doha negotiations at this point has been "uneven." He urged political commitment to achieve what he called "real progress". (Washington Trade Daily)

Tom Hamburger in the Wall St Journal summarised the US policy:

November 2001: U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick signs Doha agreement allowing countries to override drug patents to address health crises, such as AIDS and tuberculosis.

Summer 2002: In discussions over final language for the agreement, Mr Zoellick learns many countries want to use Doha provisions to treat non-epidemics, at low cost.

November 2002: Nervous about the broader interpretation, U.S.drug companies begin lobbying the White House and Congress to oppose Doha if it isn't limited to specific epidemics.

Late November - early December: Top White House aides and Sen. Bill Frist call Mr.Zoellick, urging him to protect patents in a narrowly targeted Doha deal. Mr Zoellick receives letters from two dozen drug-company CEOs and 36 members of Congress.

Dec 20: Mr Zoellick becomes the only representative among 144 WTO nations to oppose the final Doha agreement. Instead, he proposes a temporary moratorium on patent enforcement for countries facing certain epidemics.

Mr Zoellick, whose boss in the White House espouses a "compassionate conservative" approach to governing, moved to counter international critics by announcing a temporary moratorium on enforcing drug patents for poor nations facing epidemics. Separately, the president himself announced a $10 billion initiative to combat AIDS world-wide in his State of the Union Address last month.

But critics insist the patent-enforcement moratorium is a smoke screen for the administration's failure to agree to a long-term solution on the issue. "The U.S.is backtracking," says Faizel Ismail, who heads the South African delegation to the WTO. Nor has the AIDS funding quelled criticism of Mr Zoellick by international health activists. "Doha was not just about AIDS, but about access for the poor to a range of life-saving medicines in the future," says James Love, who monitors WTO talks for the Consumer Project on Technology. "The U.S.had agreed to find a solution to the problem the poorest countries have accessing affordable medicines," adds Jennifer Brant, trade-policy adviser for the international antipoverty organization Oxfam. "Now, at the behest of powerful lobbyists, the U.S.has become the obstructionist."

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4. US Service Industry demands in the US-Australia Free Trade Agreement

These statements confirm some of our fears by giving more detail about what US service companies are demanding in the US-Australia Free Trade Agreement:

February 6, 2003: Statement of Linda Schmid Vice President, Coalition of Service Industries on the Australia Free Trade Agreement before the International Trade Commission. http://www.uscsi.org/pdf/schmidit.pdf

January 15, 2003: Statement of Robert Vastine President, Coalition of Service Industries on the Australia Free Trade Agreement before the Trade Policy Staff Committee Office of the United States Trade Representative.
http://www.uscsi.org/pdf/Australi.pdf

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