Former
US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is promising to provide
her personal insights into the 2016 US presidential election when she
visits New Zealand in May.
Power
selfie: Ardern meets Clinton
The
Prime Minister met the former United States Secretary of State in
Auckland this morning.
Jacinda
Ardern and Hillary Clinton had breakfast together.
The
meeting with the former first lady and presidential candidate was
scheduled for half an hour but went longer than expected.
Mrs
Clinton will talk in front of 3000 people this evening at Auckland's
Spark Arena, sharing insights into the 2016 US election, its
aftermath, and her experience as a woman in politics.
Unlike
Former President Obama's widely reported recent
arrival,
very few people knew the former Secretary of State and New York
Senator was in town until she was spotted at a children's clothing
store in Parnell.
A
usually quiet Sunday at work turned into something far more exciting
for retail assistant Kersti Ward at Parnell Baby Boutique
.
"There
were a couple of security guys hanging around the shop for a while
before she came.
"I
thought 'oh that's a bit weird maybe Jacinda's coming in or something
like that'. They were parked across the road, there were three cars
in the bus bay and then this woman was escorted across the road and
it was Hillary Clinton."
"I
do admire her, so it was kind of a shock and I really didn't know
what to talk to her about."
Ms
Ward said she had looked into attending Mrs Clinton's talk tonight,
but it was not possible on a student budget.
Tickets
for the upper level seating start at $195 while those with a VIP
package paid $495 for the closest seats, a copy of her book and entry
to a pre-event cocktail function.
The
appeal of hearing one of the biggest newsmakers of recent times had
many jumping at the chance.
Christchurch
resident Nicola Rykers was flying up for the event with her daughter
later today.
"Back
in 1999 I was given a free ticket to go hear Bill Clinton talk at the
Antarctic Centre in Christchurch and I thought he was amazing, he's a
great orator.
"Because
the Clintons are such an influential, on a global scale, kind of
couple it was a great opportunity to hear the other half."
While
Mrs Clinton was not everyone's favourite politician, there was plenty
about her for New Zealanders to be interested in, Ms Rykers said.
"She's
a great academic and intellectual in her right and obviously has a
lot of grit and perseverance, so she is a great role model even if
you don't like her politics."
National
Council of Women president Vanisa Dhiru said Mrs Clinton's
reflections on modern leadership would be of great interest to many.
"Leaders
like this have an important place in the sphere of having female
leaders, that other women, young women, girls, can look up to. I
think being able to listen and see her in New Zealand on our soil is
amazing."
Prime
Minister Jacinda Ardern is meeting privately with Mrs Clinton this
morning but will not be attending the speech.
Hillary
Clinton will talk about her book What Happened, which
reflects on her experience during the 2016 US election race with
Donald Trump.
Event
organisers The Growth Faculty said as of last night tickets were
close to selling out but some were still available for purchase.
The
conversation is being moderated by former Prime Minister Dame Jenny
Shipley.
Donald
Trump may have removed the US from the TPP as one of the few truly
anti-globalist moves he has made. New Zealand, desptie public
pronouncements is just as wedded to neo-liberalism and the globalist
agenda as ever.
A
TPP without the United States? Who would ever have thought?
Kelsey:
Labour has shown a lack of political backbone on so-called
‘progressive’ TPPA
If
it signs the latest version of this controversial deal, Jacinda
Ardern’s government can hardly expect people to take the promise of
a progressive new model for New Zealand’s international trading
relations seriously, argues leading TPPA critic Jane Kelsey.
The
on-again, off-again Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) is
reportedly a done deal, again. Exactly one year after the Trump
administration withdrew the US from the original agreement, trade
officials from the remaining 11 countries reached consensus on a
revised TPPA-11 in Japan. The rebranded Comprehensive and Progressive
Agreement on Trans-Pacific Partnership is due to be signed in Chile
on 8 March.
Back
in 2017 Labour’s dissent to the majority select committee report on
the TPPA said it “will have ramifications for generations of New
Zealanders. For their sake, we should not so lightly enter into an
agreement which may exacerbate long-term challenges for our economy,
workforce, and society.”
What
has changed? Overall, very little. Former trade minister Tim Groser
said New Zealand had to swallow a number of dead rats to conclude the
original agreement. A number of those rats are in hibernation under
the TPPA-11, but none have been euthanised.
To
be fair, the Labour-led government was handed a poison chalice.
National excluded the opposition parties from information about the
negotiations, leaving them dependent on leaks like everyone else. It
expected – and senior Labour officials had hoped – the agreement
would have been in force before the 2017 election.
Following
a truncated treaty examination process, Labour, New Zealand First and
the Greens all wrote dissents to the select committee report,
criticising the secrecy of the TPPA process and saying they would not
support its ratification. All criticised the economics of the deal,
with Labour endorsing calls for a robust economic assessment that
included the impact on employment and wage distribution, along with a
health impact study. All three objected to the constraints on
regulating foreign investment and the controversial investor-state
dispute settlement process (ISDS). Only the Greens remain true to
that position today.
Within
two weeks of taking office, the new government attended the “final”
round of renegotiations before ministers met in Vietnam in December
to finalise the revised deal, based on wish-lists tabled by each
country. I understand New Zealand never tabled one, but I have made
an Official Information Act request to confirm this.
The
government did try to get some last-minute changes, including
side-letters from the other parties promising not to apply ISDS to
New Zealand. Most said “no”. Labour then claimed the
already-existing side letter with Australia and some other safeguards
as its own achievements, along with the consensus decisions to
suspend some provisions pending re-entry by the US. Prime Minister
Ardern and Trade Minister Parker then set about selling the same TPPA
as “progressive” and in New Zealand’s best interests.
There
were some short-term gains. The suspended provisions include some of
the toxic provisions that would have impacted on Pharmac’s process
and its leverage to reduce the monopoly price of new generation
medicines. The extension of copyright term to life plus 70 years had
been estimated to cost an average $55m a year. Most of the other
“gains” are marginal or illusory. And the legal risks still
exist, some active, some dormant (forget the idea the US might be
required to agree to abandon some of them as a condition of
re-entry).
The
obsessive secrecy that has shielded governments from accountability
over seven years of TPPA negotiations continues. According to
Japanese officials the final TPPA-11 text won’t be revealed until
after it is signed, despite David Parker saying earlier that he
wanted it released as soon as possible. Parker responded to an OIA
request, confirming the original secrecy pact to withhold all
negotiating documents for four years after the TPPA came into force,
even though this is supposedly a different agreement.
What
should a Labour-led government have done differently? First, it
should have commissioned the revised independent economic assessment
and health impact analyses it called for in opposition. Second, it
should have shown a political backbone, like the Canadian government
that also inherited the deal. Canada played hardball and successful
demanded side-letters to alter its obligations relating to investment
and auto-parts. Not great, but something. New Zealand should have
demanded similar side-letters excluding it from ISDS as a
pre-requisite for continued participation. Third, it should have
sought the suspension of the UPOV 1991 obligation, which has serious
Treaty implications, and engaged with Māori to strengthen the Treaty
of Waitangi exception, as the Waitangi Tribunal advised. Fourth, it
should have withdrawn its agreement to the secrecy pact.
None
of that happened. So what now? The government could still do all the
above, but both Labour and NZ First lack the political will. Instead,
we’ll have domestic political fight with two parties that
previously opposed ratification.
The
priority for me is to break through the information deficit and
reiterate the long-term costs of the deal, versus the minimal gains
for low quality exports of beef and dairy.
The
most crucial area of the TPPA that has not received enough attention
is the novel chapter on electronic commerce – basically, a set of
rules that will cement the oligopoly of Big Tech for the indefinite
future, allowing them to hold data offshore subject to the privacy
and security laws of the country hosting the server, or not to
disclose source codes, preventing effective scrutiny of
anti-competitive or discriminatory practices. Other rules say
offshore service providers don’t need to have a presence inside the
country, thus undermining tax, consumer protection and labour laws,
and governments can’t require locally established firms to use
local content or services.
I
asked technology minister Clare Curran in an OIA request for analysis
provided to her on the e-commerce chapter. She says that information
doesn’t exist. I have made the same request to David Parker. When I
asked him to release the legal analysis of the chapter, he indicated
he was unlikely to disclose any advice that discussed grey areas.
Hopefully he has changed his mind. Otherwise, crucially important
commitments will be adopted without the government receiving
contestable advice on the implications. The legal risks extend beyond
the TPPA-11. Similar e-commerce texts are proposed for virtually all
other mega-agreements, and New Zealand has supported moves to
negotiate them in the WTO.
The
government’s endorsement of the TPPA-11 also raises questions about
future trade strategy. The National government’s “Trade Policy
Refresh” saw it adopt a goal of free trade agreements covering 90%
of New Zealand goods exports by 2030. Parker rejects this “notches
on the belt” approach and promises a new “inclusive and
progressive” approach to trade negotiations that addresses gender,
labour, indigenous rights, environment, small and medium enterprises
and climate change. He held a rushed round of consultations in early
December – after Labour endorsed the TPPA-11 decision in Vietnam –
promising more early this year.
Parker
has endorsed the Canadian approach, which involves clip-ons to the
standard agreements, without changing rules that have negative
systemic impacts on those constituencies and issues. One example was
the statement on “trade and gender empowerment” adopted by
ministers, including New Zealand’s, at the recent WTO ministerial
in Argentina. Within 24 hours over 160 women’s groups
internationally had dismissed it as an exercise in “pink-washing”
that sought to “mainstream women into a polluted stream”.
Labour
knows it has to do better, but I don’t think it knows how,
especially if it has to get other negotiating partners on board. It
also knows that it can’t expect people to take the promise of a
progressive new model for New Zealand’s international trading
relations seriously if it signs and ratifies the TPPA-11.
New
Zealand First leader and Foreign Minister Winston Peters is defending
his party's switch to support the newly negotiated TPP, saying enough
changes have been made to the deal to allay their concerns.
After
a breakthrough at talks in Japan in recent days, 11 countries,
including New Zealand, are preparing to sign the agreement in Chile
on 8 March.
Mr
Peters and his party have opposed trade deals in the past, including
the FTA with China while he was foreign minister, negotiated under
the Labour government led by Helen Clark.
He
also campaigned against the TPP, describing it at Rātana in 2016 as
a "sham and a scam".
But
he told Morning Report the deal has been renegotiated, since the
Labour-led government took office.
"The
deal is not the deal inherited, it's different ... with substantial
changes with the types that the Canadians were holding out on as
well, that we both have seen changes that mean we can support this
deal". The
sticking point for New Zealand First had been the rules under which
foreign companies can sue governments, the investor state dispute
rules.
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