Speaking after meeting EU Trade Commissioner Karel de Gucht
about the forthcoming Transatlantic Trade & Investment Partnership (TTIP)
in Davos today (Thursday), TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said:
“US healthcare companies should know that they have been
put on notice. They should not expect the forthcoming EU-US trade deal to
protect them from a future British government restoring NHS services currently
run by private firms to the public sector.
“The EU Trade Commissioner has assured me that the consultation
exercise on foreign investors’ rights will now – as a result of union pressure
– include the option of dumping the deeply undemocratic Investor-State Dispute
Settlement (ISDS) mechanism. I left him in no doubt that unions and their
campaign partners will be demanding its removal from the TTIP.
“We must ensure that future governments are not bound to
pay unlimited compensation to companies seeking to make a killing from the
implementation of the Health and Social Care Act. Democratically elected
governments must be free to do what voters decide, and not be frightened off by
the prospect of secretive litigation.”
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