Trade Agreements all around the world to make sure that we continue
to offer our country the ability
to sell our wonderful goods. Thank you
very much. I call
Golriz Ghabhraman. It is a privilege to rise, to
speak in opposition to this bill, again
as a lone voice, representing the
Green Party in this House. We
remain opposed to the TPPA, to the CPTTPA
and any act of this parliament that
would enable the implementation of
those agreements that do seem to
overlap in areas.
Not according to Professor Kelsy. We do support trade.
New Zealand needs trade. We are a small country. We
need trade but not much of
the 6,000 pages of this particular deal seem
to relate to actual trade. They do,
however, lay out in minute
detail the privileges of
foreign multinational corporations
multinational corporations that we're giving up over the rights and
interests of New Zealanders, of
ordinary people, and of
our environment. We agree with the
oppose this bill who know the chilling effect
chilling effect that that agreement and there it this bill, will have on
New Zealand's democracy. Most
submitters, the
submitters, the overwhelming majority, raised concern with the
remainder of the ISDS
dispute settlement mechanism in this
bill through the trade agreement. That
is to say that this
House of Representatives, this elected body,
the supreme parliament is about to
pass into law an act that
allows a mechanism to sit above New Zealand's
law
mechanism to sit above New Zealand's
Representatives, above our courts in giving privileges to
foreign multinational corporations. Saying
that this parliament will take
account of their profit margins
alongside the interests of
Kiwis, our workers right, environmental
protections, our commitment
to the founding constitutional document of
this nation, Te Tiriti Waitangi,
we say that no
policymaker should be taking account of the profit margins of any
private body, let
body, let alone foreign multinationals but that is what we
are being asked
to sign up to through this bill. That's
what the submitters knew and they begged us
not to do it as
they begged us not to sign on to
this agreement, as they begged us not to sign on
to the TPPA and it does
remain largely unchanged. It represents an archaic
form of trade and we've
seen that model collapse. We've seen the
suffering that was caused by the
latest global financial crisis and
we're signing on to
the same model. That's not what New Zealanders voted
for this election. And
to focus back on the bill, what we found most
alarming in that select committee,
and there were questions from both
sides, there were questions from
the Hon Todd McClay,
and he made this clear, and the
officials in answering them made
it clear that what we're signing on to here
with this bill means that the
old TPPA can be react rated through joining
of, say, the United States, without
further parliamentary oversight,
without a select committee process,
without public input. Now
this deal was sold to New Zealand through
promises that it was changed but
we've found out since then that even
the old TPPA can come
into law without further scrutiny. Now some
of the changes that were made
are real between the TPP and the CTPPA
and it came in the
form of suspended provisions. Some of those were,
for example, the provision that now
protects PHARMAC in this deal so
that PHARMAC can independently
protect the price and quality
of medicine for
medicine for New Zealanders. That was one. There's
provisions that protect our patent and copy
right laws so that New Zealanders can
compete on an even playing field
against these
against these large established multinationals. These are good
things. But we also learnt
through the process the officials told us
there is nothing in this bill that
says that were a new member state to
join, whether it is the US or any
member state, those provisions
could be lifted
member state, those provisions could
go without parliamentary oversight. So we are signing away our ability
to oversee these changes, the
very changes that the Coalition parties
relied upon to sell this deal as a
changed new progressive deal.
All of that could go and there will be no
parliamentary
parliamentary oversight, no democratic process. That is
chilling.
democratic process. That is chilling. So the Green Party
doesn't support the bill, we support
democracy for New Zealanders. We do
support it's our future's call
democracy for New Zealanders. We do
essentially changes to the bill that say that no further ISDS can be
added to this agreement without
parliament coming back and having
a look at it. That's a big change but
it's also still limited. But
if we could at least say that if new
member states are
going to join, and they will be signing on to a deal
with ISDS in it, with
that mechanism sitting above our law, that at
least parliament should have
a say. We shoulded a least get to look
at it again. That is how the bill could
introduce some meaningful
protection. But what's more, we
say that trade should change, that trade
deal, international agreements,
should always come to parliament,
that those deals shouldn't be
allowed to be made with complete
lack of transparency in those
dark corners of the international
financial markets
financial markets where corporate lawyers agree to the text
and it's yeahs before the public are
allowed to look at it. It is as a result of
leaks that experts like Professor
Jane Kelsy get to look
at those deals and tell us what's in them and
tell us what's been signed away. We
say it should be parliament who
decides what we sign onto in
such a critical area. Trade, and
a trade agreement particularly like
this one, affects everything in
our lives. If our health and our
environment is on the
lives. If our health and our
heard from so many sectors about the way they would be limited, the most
chilling were hearing about
the doctors. They
doctors. They asked what would happen if they want to introduce
warnings on alcohol packaging to
warn mothers against foetal alcohol
Zealand. What happens if we want to introduce a sugar tax to protect
the public against toxic junk food
that's clogging up our health system
and
that's clogging up our health system
mostly, as a Green, I want it noted that around the world
where ISDS clauses identical to this have
been used they have been used to
stop environmental protection
environmental protection from being implemented. This
implemented. This bill could affect our ability, for example, to reform
our mining sector and say
that exploration
exploration permits won't automatically
automatically turn into mining permits. Those are the
types of progressive change that we
promise New Zealand this
election and they could be at risk. So
we won't support this bill because we support
a truly progressive,
transformative Government and change for
New Zealand. We say that we owe it to
the global order and we
owe it to New Zealanders that we do trade
differently from now on and we
say that the vast majority, the
incredible, overwhelming opposition to this trade agreement and to
this bill, should mean that the
Government rethinks ratifying this,
the agreement through the
bill. We say that that's the only way
to honour democracy in New
Zealand. Thank you. I call the Hon Tim
MacIndoe. I would like to
start with a number of positives because
in is actually a very good moment for the
House and I will
surprise the Green member who just resumed her seat
by praising her in
the first instance. Because while I disagree
with her position, as do members of
all other parties in the House, I
do respect the fact that
it is important to have a voice in the House
for those who are opposed