Seenators recommend Labor back FTA.

[Matilda]

The three Labor senators on a committee examing Australia's proposed
free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States have urged their
party to back the deal.

(snip)

The committee has handed in its final report this afternoon and
ahead of its release, the three Labor senators announced they had
given the FTA their qualified support.

But the labor committee members are seeking measures to protect
manufacturers, the media and the price os subsidised medicines in
Australia.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200408/s1166955.htm

Damn, damn, damn! If Latham supports this, I can't vote for him,
it's a huge sellout. I'm beginning to think he's just a bully-boy
after all - lots of noise, but in the end, a coward.

The Sydney Morning Herald are currently running an online poll
regarding the FTA, and it's running at 80% against. Of course,
there's a margin of error with these polls, but 80% is significant.

Doesn't public opinion count for anything any more?

[beef]

1. Funny thing is...

This land was stolen from the Aborigines and now is being sold to the Americans. What a sad state of affairs.

Labor has lost my vote, they're becoming more like the Liberals (like the US Repubs.) every day.

Go the Greenies.

[Matilda]

2. Yes, the only way to go is Green.

Welcome to DU!

(At last I feel I've been here long enough to say that).

[newyawker99]

8. Hi beef!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[robcon]

3. It's great news for the U.S. and Australia.

Tomorrow the U.S.-Australia FTA will be signed...

"On Tuesday, President Bush signs H.R. 4759, the United States-Australia Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act at the Rose Garden.."

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/politics/TheNote/TheNote.html

[Matilda]

4. No, it's great news for the American media barons, and Big Pharma.

Please tell me when any FTA with the U.S. has benefitted any group
except the U.S. multinationals?

[robcon]

5. When FTA's helped both the U.S, and other nations...

Off the top of my head - GATT, Kennedy Round; GATT, Uruguay Round; NAFTA; WTO; Chilean-American FTA; CAFTA.

[Matilda]

6. Benefits are generally one-sided, but that does depend on the

economy of the co-signers. Canada has not been hit as hard as
Mexico, where local farmers are in deep crisis due to imports of
cheap grain from the US, and Canadians are not happy about tariffs
put on their wood exports to the US, not supposed to be happening.
Third-world countries inevitably suffer from cheap imports (it also
happens in Africa where the UK floods African markets with cheap
produce, killing off the local industries which are clearly unable
to compete). Locals - as in the Mexican maquiladoras - are then
forced to work as virtual slave labor in factories owned by US
corporations, or they don't work at all.

This won't happen in Australia, but US Trade Commissioner Robert
Zoellick has been open about the desire of Big Pharma, with the
backing of the US government, to erode the benefits of our
Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, which keeps the costs of prescription
drugs down to an affordable level, and while American farm produce
will have the benefit of no tariffs almost immediately, our beef
farmers will have to wait 20 years for tariffs to disappear on
imports to the US, and our sugar farmers will be forced to compete
directly with heavily-subsidised imports from the US.

That's for starters - please tell me how we will be better off if
we have to drop all our subsidies, while the US is allowed to keep
theirs?

[robcon]

7. I don't see it, Matilda

Matilda wrote "please tell me how we will be better off if
we have to drop all our subsidies, while the US is allowed to keep
theirs?"

If you've got that impression, I'd like to see where you got it.

Please take a look at the agreement, and show me where the U.S. has maintained tariffs, or maintained subsidies, while Australia drops theirs on a different schedule. I've looked at the summary, and can't find any instance of that.

I'm not arguing that trade is free between Australia and the U.S., only a lot freer than it was. This is a great step forward.

http://www.dfat.gov.au/trade/negotiations/us_fta/guide/index.html

[Matilda]

9. Why don't I just link you to the Greens statement on FTA.

I trust the Greens as the only party that genuinely cares about
this country and its welfare. They're clearly not in bed with
big business, because their agenda is totally antithetical to that
of corporations.

Link here to Bob Brown's senate page on FTA:

http://www.greens.org.au/hotissues/usfta

Our PBS system is the envy of many other countries, and in the U.S.
a number of states are studying how it works as a possible model
for them to follow. Howard's natural constituency, just like that
of Bush, is the world of big corporations, and he will sacrifice
individuals and the whole country if he has to to ensure that he
will be looked after with seats on boards of multinationals when
he retires.

The man has no pride and no shame - he is a toady, and will do
whatever it takes to please his corporate masters.

[robcon]

10. Well, I trust myself that I care about the U.S. and its trading partners

The trade treaty will, as every free-trade treaty before it, increase employment, reduce costs and increase competition.

Nothing in the Green Party page indicates anything different. It lists some aspects of the treaty, but the Green Party seems to object to the treaty because some corporations will win, and some lose, via the treaty.