After a month-long delay, the European Parliament this week voted on recommendations of the "chamber of citizens" on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership TTIP (“Lange report”). The compromise amendment between Social Democrats and Christian Democrats on the controversial private investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), which had been tabled in the last minute, and the entire report were adopted. Even though the original plans of the Commission on unfair privileges for foreign investors were rejected, the hope for clear rejection of investor privileges did not materialise.

Compromise on ISDS adopted thanks to “Great coalition” – Social Democrats divided

After the vote on the TTIP Resolution had been delayed by a month, this week saw a showdown in Strasbourg: The President of the EP Martin Schulz (SPD) and TTIP rapporteur Bernd Lange (SPD) negotiated with the Christian Democrats a compromise on ISDS, which is “to replace” ISDS by a “new system” to guarantee investor protection. In contrast to many other Social Democrats, the entire SPÖ delegation neither voted in favour of the amendment nor of the entire resolution. Nevertheless, it was adopted with a majority of 436 to 241 votes. The SPÖ MEP Evelyn Regner argued that “reforming private arbitration courts” was not sufficient and therefore the Austrian Social Democrats were not able “to agree to the watered down compromise”. However, Bernd Lange argued that “his” report would contain numerous achievements for citizens, such as the demand to implement the international ILO Core Labour Standards, which include among other the right to collective bargaining, on both sides of the Atlantic. Currently the United States have only adopted two of the eight fundamental standards (the standards against forced labour and the worst forms of child labour).

AK “NO 2 ISDS!” campaign a complete success

Over 45,000 digital signatures were collected within the scope of the AK campaign against investor privileges (“NO 2 ISDS!”), which were regularly sent to MEPs. In spite of the justified criticism of the compromise, one must not forget that without the loud voice of civil society the outcome would have certainly been very different. Fact is that the original plans of the Commission to enable pseudo courts, which in locked backrooms could oblige sovereign states to make payments worth millions to foreign investors, have died.

Fundamental problem remains: privileges for foreign investors continue

However, the fundamental argument of AK and ÖGB that it is inacceptable in terms of democracy to grant foreign investors unilateral special rights towards the general public remains. Whilst corporations do not enter into any risk – they only appear as potential prosecutors and in most cases do not bear the cost of proceedings – the best outcome for the state is only “not to lose”, but it can never win. Fact is that there is no special jurisdiction for violations of foreign investors against human or labour rights! It therefore remains a mystery why so many politicians are in favour of such arbitration courts, which above all serve to (financially) weaken states. Apart from that, giving preference to foreign over domestic investors also discriminates against SMEs, which according to numerous business representatives would be the alleged main beneficiary of the TTIP.