TPP looks after the big end of town, but ignores people and the environment

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ustralia’s decision to sign up to the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) appears to be about looking after the big end of town.

Details of the agreement are scant and all that has been divulged to this point from the secretive, but massively important discussions is trickle of positive news about the benefits the agreement will bring.

TPP boosters argue that if the deal is good for Australia’s corporations, it is good for most everyone because of the trickle down factor.

With the money flowing in at the top, it is contended, it will trickle down to enrichen all levels of society – that’s a flawed argument with history clearly illustrating that under the present economic regime it rarely trickles down and it is always the rich who get richer and the rest simply struggle along.

The TPP was written it seems to primarily enrich the legal fraternity as almost any decision from that of sovereign decisions made by countries about protecting their lifestyles and their environments to individuals preserving personal sovereignty, can with ease become a source of litigation.

The rapacious wants of the world’s corporations, which they have embedded in the world community, have played a key role in the worsening of climate change.

Should countries determine that certain legislation was required to protect their environment, legislation that might slow or stop a corporation’s profit endeavours then it is within the bounds of the TPP for the affected corporation to take legal action against that country.

It’s another instance in which profit has been given precedence over people.

One who is not sure about the TPP is Michael West who has written about this mysterious agreement in The Age - “TPP: 'She's a beauty, mate!' Really?”

-       Robert McLean.

'Jobs, jobs, jobs' is hollow argument - Ross Gittins

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Jobs, jobs, jobs” is the cry of the Australian Coalition Government and it has been the Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, who has said he will never put the environment ahead of the economy.

Ross Gittins - questioning the
pleas of the Abbott Government.

And with the environment running in a distant last place, the government is doing all it can to ensure massive industrial projects become a fixed part of our landscape, and along with that, the jobs they promise.

This endless bleating about jobs is a fallacy as explained by Ross Gittins in his article in today’s Age - “Economists' concerns with emissions reduction target not what you'd expect.”