From: Matthew Benson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'[EMAIL PROTECTED]'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: DFAT Consultations on the WTO - REMINDER
Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 15:05:07 +1000
Just a reminder that submissions to DFAT should be sent by the end of this
week (if by snail mail) as they are due May 1st. A sample submission is
below.
Mr Steve Moran
Trade Negotiations Division
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
Dear Mr Moran
I wish to record my grave concerns over the proposal to include
negotiations on a Multilateral Agreement on Investment, as curently
proposed, within the World Trade Organisation negotiations to be started
in November of this year.
My primary reason for this is that the text of the proposed MAI, as it
has been circulated on the Net and elsewhere, proposes nothing short of
removing national control over many activities of trans national
companies (TNCs). I have nothing against TNCs as such; indeed I have
shareholdings in several. But I do have serious reservations about the
way in which some TNCs blatantly flout the tax and environmental laws of
supposedly independent jurisdictions even before the proposed MAI.
The evidence of that lies in both the well documented ways in which TNCs
shuffle their accounts so as to pay tax in the (for them) lowest tax
regimes and the equally well documented ways in which some TNCs have
blighted both societies and their environments through pushing
inappropriate and even dangerous products and through producing toxic
wastes, particularly in third world countries.
I can see no overall benefits for any country including Australia in
exempting TNCs from any of the laws of their jurisdictions and I suggest
that any national Government which might be considering such exemptions
is, quite simply, ignoring its primary obligation which is to look after
the interests of all its people (the whole electorate; not a small
clique of the wealthy and powerful).
I would make two further points:
* the federal Government is currently making much noise about its
proposed fundamantal tax reforms. Before the Australian Government
contemplates any international agreement on investment it needs to
be in a position to lock in Australia's share of the profits of
TNCs operating here. This requires serious consideration not only
of the operation of withholding tax but also of a financial
transactions tax which can pick up even a tiny fraction of the
money which moves daily in the international money market (often,
one must imagine, for purely speculative reasons or capital gains
which the investment funds seem to seek). It also requires a
somewhat more realistic assessment than the Government is
presenting the people of Australia about the effects of levels of
domestic taxation which may be slightly higher here than in some
countries and is slightly lowere than on most OECD countries
* any action by the Australian Government to involve itself in MAI
negotiations at this stage must be considered premature because of
- and even in contempt of - the current inquiry of the House of
Representatives' Standing Committee on Economics, Finance and
Public Administration on the International Financial Market Effects
on Government Policy.Until that Committee has reported and the
Government has forumulated a coherent policy response, one cannot
be confident that Australia can safely front up to discussions of a
MAI.
Yours sincerely
[...]
copy to: The Secretary
House of Representatives Standing Committee
on Economics, Finance and Public Administration
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