The Hon Mark Vaile MP
Minister for Trade
Parliament House
Canberra

Mark.Vaile.MP@aph.gov.au

Dear Mr Vaile

I am writing to express deep concern about proposals in the WTO General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) negotiations.

The negotiations aim to increase the range of services listed by governments in the GATS. The definition of public services in the GATS is ambiguous and it is not clear that public services are excluded from negotiations as you have claimed. Moreover, there has been discussion in the Working Party on GATS rules to define government funding of public services as "subsidies" to which corporations might have access through competitive tendering, a form of privatisation. There are also proposals to apply a "least trade restrictive" rule to some regulation. This would mean that some government regulation of services could be challenged by other governments under the WTO disputes process as barriers to trade. I oppose these proposals and believe, with the majority of Australian people, that public policy about regulation, public funding and provision of essential services should be made democratically by governments at national and local levels, not signed away in trade agreements.

The negotiations have now progressed to the point where governments have made specific requests of other governments. The European Union (EU) requests to Australia became public in February 2003.

The EU document confirmed my fears about the negotiations. The EU is requesting the removal of all limits on foreign investment in services like Telstra and the removal of the Foreign Investment Review Board. The EU document also requests Australia to open to private investment all postal services "handled by any type of commercial operator, whether public or private." This would mean privatisation of Australia Post and the end of the 45c standard letter charge which gives people in rural and regional areas affordable access to postal services. The EU document also asks Australia to list all water services in the GATS. This would reduce that ability of state governments to make decisions about the public ownership and public regulation of water services.

EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy visited Canberra and was quoted in the Australian Financial Review of 17/7/02. "Mr Lamy said the EU wanted Australia to lift restrictions on foreign ownership of Telstra and the sensitive water distribution industry in return for any concessions from Europe on barriers to agricultural trade. " (p1)

This shows the danger of such requests where issues are being negotiated behind closed doors and "traded off" with other WTO agreements like agriculture. I believe that government policy should be transparent and exposed to public debate. Your GATS discussion paper of February 2003 does not give full details of requests received or any indication of the Australian government's response .

I request

• publication of Australia's GATS full negotiating requests, the requests from other governments, and Australia's proposed responses

• suspension of the negotiations pending full public and parliamentary debate of the above

• no reduction in the ability of governments to regulate services through a "least trade restrictive test"

• clear exclusion of health, education, postal and water and other public services from the GATS agreement

• GATS and other trade agreements to be ratified by parliament, not by Cabinet.

I look forward to your response.

Yours sincerely

(Name, Address, Date)

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