The Sydney Morning Herald Wednesday March 4, 1998
by Paul Cleary
Economic Correspondent
Introductory comment:
The inaccuracies of this article and the complete exclusion of Pauline Hanson and One Nation - who exposed MAI in Australia has got to be addressed. This is no accident. The Sydney Morning Herald have been antagonistic and misreported Pauline Hanson since she won the federal seat of Oxley.
All comments not in the original article are shown in red or as links to external web pages.
“In other words nothing will be signed, nothing will be bound in any way, shape or form until it is tabled on the floor of the Australian Parliament, made public...”
See Graham Strachan's comments on this issue.
The Federal Government was secretly negotiating an international treaty that could allow multinational companies to override Australia’s environment and labour laws, opposition groups claimed yesterday.
The Opposition and the Australian Democrats both called for parliamentary inquiries into a new treaty known as the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI), which could be signed by Australia as early as next month.
Pauline Hanson's One Nation who brought the issue into the public arena on the 21st January 1998 is totally ignored by this biased, and as you will see, misinformed journalist.
This reaction followed a surprise warning by the former chief justice of the High Court, Sir Anthony Mason, that the MAI negotiations had been kept under a ‘veil of secrecy’ by treasury.
The MAI is being negotiated under the auspices of the Paris based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which says it hopes to establish an in-principal agreement next month.
Negotiations have been underway since May 1995, but a draft agreement has not been made public.
Wrong - we have three draft versions of the agreement on line.
The agreement is aimed at promoting global investment, but it could prevent individual nations from having laws that are contrary to the liberal principles of the MAI. These laws include labour standards, immigration, the environment and foreign investment.
Sir Anthony warned, “The negotiation so far as Australia is concerned is in the hands of Treasury. The negotiation is not an open process.
“At the end of the day it is possible that the terms will be set in concrete leaving Australia with very limited choices to make, the effective choices having been made by Treasury and the Federal Cabinet during the course of the unpublished negotiations.”
The Opposition Foreign Affairs spokesman, Mr Laurie Brereton, called on Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee for Treaties to conduct an inquiry into the implications of the MAI. The Australian Democrats made a similar call. Both parties expect the Government’s support to review the MAI following assurances yesterday from the Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Fischer.
The ALP, under Peter Cook, initiated negotiations in May 1995 - how can they suddenly claim innocence and ignorance?
“Let me give you an absolute assurance that this process involving the multilateral agreement on investment will be subject to the new treaty process established by the Coalition government,” Mr Fischer told ABC radio.
“In other words nothing will be signed, nothing will be bound in any way, shape or form until it is tabled on the floor of the Australian Parliament, made public and then maybe, after that, those steps will be taken.”
See Pauline Hanson's speech to parliament on March 9th 1998.
The Australian Conservation Foundation called on the Treasurer, Mr Costello, to defer the signing of the MAI until the public had been given the opportunity to debate the issue in full.
The ACF’s Ms Anna Reynolds said the treaty had “far-reaching and worrying implications for domestic decision-making, including the area of environmental protection”.
The ACF understood that the Government would be represented at a crucial meeting in Paris next month where in principle agreement could be given, she said.
The ACF have never known to be associated with concerns with the MAI until this article. The re-writing of history is complete.