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THE GREEN PARTY TD Neasa Hourigan has said that efforts to push government approval of key elements of the controversial CETA EU-Canada trade deal are “extraordinary” and “cynical”.
A vote on the deal was to be held in the Dáil yesterday, but it was postponed until next month after several TDs raised concerns about it.
A split in the Green Party has emerged over the deal with Hourigan and his colleague Patrick Costello, who say they will not back full ratification of the trade deal.
Hourigan said TheJournal.ie the current atmosphere at the party is “unpleasant.”
“A senior staff member told the parliamentary party that my position on CETA was delusional this week. So it is a rather aggressive and unpleasant work environment. “
Hourigan, the party’s finance spokesman, said this type of comment “is not helpful” and “is not respectful.”
Most of the provisions of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), which will remove the vast majority of trade barriers between Canada and the European Union, are already in force.
Once ratified, CETA will allow, among other things, companies to sue the Irish state through a new ‘Investor Court System’ for regulatory decisions that negatively affect their profits.
Concerns have been raised about the impact this could have on the implementation of legislation in areas such as climate change, health and housing.
Hourigan said there is “absolutely no time pressure” for Ireland to ratify the agreement and that we should wait to see the results of the discussions in other European countries.
“It is an extraordinary position to take, considering that there is absolutely no time pressure on CETA’s decision. There is a constitutional challenge in Germany. Cyprus has challenged it too, and the Dutch Greens have recently blocked it.
“It seems a strange decision to try to push this the way they have done, particularly since we discussed it during the government negotiations and it does not appear in the Government Program.”
The government says the agreement, which came into effect on a provisional basis in 2017 pending full ratification by member states, provides Irish and European producers, manufacturers and exporters with unprecedented access to the Canadian market.
The deal has been ratified by 14 EU member states so far, but countries like Germany and Italy have yet to do so.
The deal here has met with strong opposition from environmental activists, the Irish Trade Union Congress and opposition parties.
Ratification of CETA does not appear in the Program for Government (PfG), but the document commits to support “new and existing EU trade agreements,” as some in government have pointed out this week.
Hourigan, who helped negotiate the PfG, said that many of the business elements of the agreement are already in place, and she and others worked hard to ensure that the CETA agreement was not specifically mentioned on the show.
“Most of the CETA agreement is already in effect. Therefore, the implementation of the Investment Court System has absolutely no impact on whether we have access to those markets or not. “
‘No concerns raised’
However, Roderic O’Gorman, Hourigan’s party colleague, Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, said TheJournal.ie that an upcoming vote on CETA was marked within the parliamentary party in early November.
“In two briefing notes it was noted that the issue around CETA was emerging and the week before the Cabinet was raised verbally at our party’s parliamentary meeting, and at no time from November 6 to last Thursday, when it was raised All of a sudden, this was raised by any member of the parliamentary party, ”O’Gorman said.
“I think there is a narrative out there that this came up in the parliamentary party, that is not correct.
“When members of the parliamentary party expressed concern that they felt this was being decided too quickly, at the advisory level we reached out to Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael and pointed out that there were some concerns,” O’Gorman said.
“We include many things in the Government Program, stopping CETA was not one of them.”
The Greens parliamentary party was told last month that the party understood “that there is no risk that the ICS (Investor Court System – the controversial dispute resolution process) could overrule the Irish courts or overturn any passed legislation. by the Oireachtas “.
However, Hourigan said he was not aware of a vote on the motion until last Friday.
“The fact is that this is directly contrary to the policy of the Green Party and not the government program,” he said.
U-turn party
Hourigan said he asked party leader Eamon Ryan and others in the cabinet why they supported a Dáil vote on the deal. At the time of publication, he had not received a response.
“I asked why he was rushing the week before Christmas with a 55 minute debate and got no response.”
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Ryan met with Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Tánaiste Leo Varadkar on Monday night to discuss the vote.
Later, a spokesman said the leaders met and “reiterated their support for ratification.”
“However, they agreed to reschedule it for January, as this will allow for a longer and more thoughtful debate.”
Ryan previously campaigned against CETA, before entering the government with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.
So don’t be behind the door now @EamonRyan in staying true to what you believe about CETA. The Dáil cannot ratify the CETA without the votes of @greenparty_ie TD, and I don’t see it in the Government Program. #PostponeTheCETAVote pic.twitter.com/JETuNiy0Ap
– Oisín Coghlan (@OisinCoghlan) December 14, 2020
At its National Convention in 2016, the Green Party passed a motion, proposed by the Brussels Greens, which stated that the party “believes that the practice of giving investors exclusive rights outside the normal judicial system to sue countries for changes in the legislation that affects profits is an affront to democracy ”.
The motion went on to state that the party “would work for the rejection of CETA by Ireland and the European Parliament.”
Hourigan said that party leaders “have the right to discuss with our coalition partners, as they see fit, make whatever agreements they deem appropriate,” but “ultimately, the party has a very clear policy on this issue and a very clear history of activism on this issue. ” ”.
“There is no mechanism to unilaterally override that, we would need a special convention to do so.”
‘Incredibly cynical’
Hourigan said the efforts by some members of the government, including some of his colleagues in the Green Party, to link the ratification of the deal to a post-Brexit recovery are “incredibly cynical.”
“No matter what we do in the coming months with CETA, it has a long way to go because all countries have to ratify it before this aspect. [the court system] knock instead. And that will take some time.
“To link it in any way to the Brexit recovery is incredibly cynical, it has nothing to do with Brexit. It does not open new markets for us, 80% of CETA is already underway.
“So using that fear to push something forward without proper supervision and without listening to internal debates in other countries is extraordinary.”
With report by Cónal Thomas
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