Tisa WTF, never heard of it

[Aianawa]

Just checking on news back home while on holiday and this I have never heard of > http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/ar...ectid=11280883


The more startling news is that our Government, with almost 50 other countries, is negotiating another secret deal in the shadows of the World Trade Organisation. They are calling to negotiate a Trade in Services Agreement (Tisa).

It is part of a troika: along with the TPP and the deal the US is negotiating with the European Union, it aims to create a new set of global rules that are designed exclusively to serve commercial interests.

This is no exaggeration. Last week US corporates held a launch for what they call Team Tisa. The co-chairs are Citigroup, Liberty Mutual, IBM, MetLife, UPS and Walmart. Leading members of Congress and the US Trade Representative were invited to speak.



If we thought the TPP was secretive - background documents remain secret for four years after any deal is done - Tisa proponents want to keep their documents secret for five years.

They aim to create an unrestricted global market for services, just as TPP is aimed at the Asia-Pacific. That means locking open the door to foreign corporations that dominate the world's media, IT, finance, tourism, transport, healthcare, education sectors and more.

They also want to make light-handed regulation the global norm. A standstill rule aims to freeze the existing level of regulation as the new bottom line.

What Wikileaks posted was the draft chapter on financial services. We can assume it will be very similar to the TPP's financial services chapter.



Continued below.


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This is especially scary, because it aims to extend the model of liberalised and deregulated financial markets that brought us the global financial crisis.

The International Monetary Fund has criticised the US and EU for being in denial over the risks this model poses to themselves and the world. Yet they are pushing a more extreme version in Tisa, and, presumably, in the TPP.

The Wikileaks expose caused a flurry across the Tasman. Journalists realised that Tisa could threaten the four pillars policy that prevents mergers and takeovers among the Australian banks, who own most of ours.

Limiting competition means less reckless behaviour. Removing those restraints means pressure for even higher returns and temptations to play Russian roulette in the shadow banking system.

That adds a further downside to the TPP, in return for what? Suggestions from President Barack Obama that the US is committed to full liberalisation and will "put the blowtorch on Japan" are fanciful.

So, in my view, is the Prime Minister's pledge that he would walk away from a deal that wasn't good enough for New Zealand. The secrecy makes the Government the sole judge of the final package. It is nigh on impossible to change after that. The political risks from selling out will be limited, given the timeline has stretched into 2015.

The 12 countries involved, including the US and Japan, are never going to give up all their tariffs on agriculture.

Our Trade Minister Tim Groser has conceded as much. Nor is the US going to force a recalcitrant Japan to exit. The entire deal would be economically meaningless without Japan.

There are two more likely options. Either no deal is reached because there are too few gains for the major players and the costs of capitulation are too high. Or the US and Japan will strike a pragmatic pact that each can sell at home. The rest, including New Zealand, will have to forage for the leftovers. Wikileaks has shown the price for New Zealand would be more than unaffordable medicines, loss of internet freedom and foreign investors suing our government.

A TPP, along with Tisa, would also heighten the prospect of another global financial crisis.

Jane Kelsey is a law professor at the University of Auckland.

Debate on this article is now closed.

- NZ Herald


By Jane Kelsey

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[Gale Frierson]

And of course we must add into the mix, the Brits pulling out of the EU.

[Aianawa]

Yes, controlled chaos, glove now fits.

[Aianawa]

Am a wee bit out of the loop at, is the Tisa data getting out as such ?.

[modwiz]

Am a wee bit out of the loop at, is the Tisa data getting out as such ?.

It would appear not.

[Aianawa]

Diabollockalliyogaish.

[modwiz]

Diabollockalliyogaish.

LOL. Whatever. Keep posting and we might make the 100k by July 2.

[Dreamtimer]

There is a fellow named Alfred de Zayas, an independent expert with the UN who is 'assigned the task to apply the standards of international law to proposed treaties, to determine whether they’re in accord with international law.' On June 24 he issued a finding 'that the proposed treaty violates international laws, and is inconsistent with democracy.' There is more about it in an article from Global Research. http://www.globalresearch.ca/ttp-tti...llegal/5532672

"In a statement to the Council of Europe, on April 19th, de Zayas had said: “Two ontologies seem to have been lost in the ideologically-driven corporate narrative. Firstly, the ontology of the State, its raison d’être to legislate in the public interest, including preventative measures to avert potential harm to the population. Secondly, the ontology of business, which is to take calculated risks for profit.” He meant there that these proposed treaties, which would enable the latter to override the former — enable international investors to override national sovereignty of democratic nations, and which would impose their own system of ‘arbitration’ that isn’t required to adhere to any nation’s laws and constitution — violate international law."

This sums up what's really been bothering me about the way things have been going economically.

[Elen]

"In a statement to the Council of Europe, on April 19th, de Zayas had said: “Two ontologies seem to have been lost in the ideologically-driven corporate narrative. Firstly, the ontology of the State, its raison d’être to legislate in the public interest, including preventative measures to avert potential harm to the population. Secondly, the ontology of business, which is to take calculated risks for profit.” He meant there that these proposed treaties, which would enable the latter to override the former — enable international investors to override national sovereignty of democratic nations, and which would impose their own system of ‘arbitration’ that isn’t required to adhere to any nation’s laws and constitution — violate international law."

That says it all in a nutshell...and is the way works, I'm afraid... Shocking

[Aianawa]

But ffs this explains the pre organised exit by Britain by tptW.

[Elen]

Googled Tisa and came up with this web-site. I do not know how reliable this is, but thought to share it with you...

What is TiSA?

TiSA is a highly secretive major new trade and investment deal which seeks to lock in forever the privatisation of public services. It is currently being negotiated between 50 different countries, and if you haven't heard about it, that's because they don't want you to!

TiSA, the 'Trade in Services Agreement', is a central plank of the ‘new generation’ trade deals negotiated - alongside TTIP, CETA and the TPP – by and for big business. Together they represent an unprecedented attack on fundamental human rights and democracy.

Secret talks

TiSA negotiations began in secret in 2012 after being initiated by the USA. Together with a group of countries calling themselves the 'Really Good Friends of Services', the US and EU have been key drivers in the negotiations. ‘Offers’ of initial negotiating positions were presented at the end of 2013.

However, negotiations were dealt a blow in September 2015 when both Uruguay and Paraguay announced they would leave the negotiations, citing concerns about the deal stopping them from being able to regulate in the public interest.

Leaks

A first leak of TiSA documents took place in 2014. Shortly afterwards, while heralding its commitment to ‘transparency’, the European Commission published its offers online.

In 2015, Wikileaks released more leaked documents in three waves. The documents, accessible here, cover annexes including energy, financial services and public procurement.

Wikileaks has undertaken an analysis of its December leak of the TiSA ‘core text’, available here. War on Want allies Public Services International and Our World Is Not For Sale have also published a report entitled 'The Really Good Friends of Transnational Corporations Agreement'.

Building the fightback

War on Want has already joined allies, coordinated by the Seattle to Brussels Network, in signing a civil society letter to the European Parliament’s trade committee calling for an immediate halt to TiSA negotiations.

The letter highlights how TiSA aims to bring about broad liberalisation of sensitive sectors such as finance and public procurement, how it lacks transparency and accountability, restricts democratic decision-making, fails to protect workers’ rights and threatens public services.

Much like related new generation trade deals, TTIP, CETA and TPP, TiSA must be stopped!

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EriEOWHPqcU


Read about it here: http://waronwant.org/what-tisa

[Aianawa]

Been shoving this out on FB, from our forum, may get a wee bit of traction.

[modwiz]

Been shoving this out on FB, from our forum, may get a wee bit of traction.

Wee is probably right. We can't get many of our own members to get interested in giving us a few mercy posts. An ant colony has a better sense of community.

[Cearna]

Aianawa, come and join us on what is after all your own commenced thread. You keep putting the threads out there, hoping for a response, well, the response is there, come and join us. You will not be sorry to see what you began, has taken flight.

[modwiz]

Yes, Aianawna. Just follow Cearna's voice and vent there. Or anywhere. Question everything.

Gimli will lend a hand. Just point him in TISA's direction.