NEWSLETTER– March 2006

Website: www.wtj.org.uk

SINGLE ISSUE LOCAL CAMPAIGNING

This is what we do isn’t it? There are plenty of ups and downs in trying to organise ‘events’ and to keep some kind of momentum going. I suppose we haven’t done too badly since our establishment three years ago. We certainly have carried the message to a lot of people in Wirral and we know of quite a few who have begun to look at national and international policies more closely as a result. If you’d like to get a bit more involved, we have a vacancy on our Committee. Our single issue is

TRADE JUSTICE

- not to be confused with ‘Fair Trade’ and certainly not with ‘Free Trade’. The national Trade Justice Movement is looking for every opportunity to keep the pressure on politicians to devise ways of improving trading conditions for countries outside of the affluent world. Here is a quote from Alan Johnson, Trade and Industry Secretary:

‘The cancellation of debt for Africa is important. The doubling of aid to Africa is important. But trade talks dwarf all that. We can increase the African economies by 7 times as much as all the aid, just by reaching agreement (in the WTO trade talks) in the next few months’.

THE UN MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS

This was the subject we discussed at the public meeting we had in the Autumn, when we also held the AGM. It was well-attended and the speaker, Janet Blackman, a board member of the United Nations Association (UK), was very well received.

ABOUT WATER

Everyone needs clean, safe water to live. In urban and in many rural areas this cannot be supplied without money. How can poor countries secure a good water supply?

Borrow the money? This often leads to the donor such as the world bank or U.K. government pressurising the country to privatise their water supply or part of it.

This is not automatically a bad thing. Modern advanced techniques could be helpful. In Argentina for example there are some areas where the supply has been privatised resulting in an 8% fall in child mortality and 25% in some very poor areas.

However there are many examples of exploitation. In Manila, Tanzania and Ghana privatisation has led to increased tariffs, the service has not improved, there is no commitment to expand the service and profits go abroad to foreign water companies.

There are examples of local community schemes successfully improving water access in poor areas in Bangladesh, Ghana and Brazil which could be used as models.

The U.K. government gives millions of aid money to buy expensive advice on water supplies from multinational companies with an interest in privatisation and also to fund pro-privatisation campaigns - and then subsidises private water suppliers.

Can we - should we - stop this? ‘Transforming water into a tradeable commodity is only acceptable if it also increases its supply and if the supply for poor people remains affordable’. (With acknowledgements to Christian Aid and WDM). Jill Loach.

LOBBY OF PARLIAMENT ON 2 NOVEMBER 2005

"Wirral Trade Justice members’ lobby of MPs - November 2nd

Six members of WTJ travelled together by train to London to try to lobby our M.P.s.

We had all contacted them beforehand to tell them of our intentions with varying results. Ben Chapman (Wirral South) arranged for me and 4 other constituents to talk with him in his office in Portcullis House. Frank Field (Birkenhead) had several engagements on the day (including David Blunket’s resignation), but found time to take Paula Horton into Portcullis House for a chat. Stephen Hesford (Wirral West), at first a little elusive, also came out to rescue his 4 constituents from a damp queue and took them inside to hear their views. All three M.P.s were sympathetic to our views and agreed to our requests to write to Alan Johnson to ask him what the government was going to do to respond to the concerns of the Trade Justice movement.

Although it would have been unrealistic to expect that we could get all that we are asking for at the WTO talks, we all felt it was a day well spent; underlining our demands and those of WTJ. Of course we realise, more than ever, that the campaign must go on and it will take a long time yet." Jill Loach.

(We didn’t lobby Angela Eagle because we have no members in Wallasey. Can you sign up a friend from that constituency as a member, to complete our coverage?)

AFTER THE G8 SUMMIT – IS THERE A WAY OUT OF WORLD POVERTY?

The July 2005 G8 summit in Gleneagles agreed to increase aid to developing countries and to reduce debt repayments by the even less developed countries, but did little about TRADE JUSTICE, which is the surest way to lift people out of poverty.

Then came the December 2005 WTO ministerial meeting in Hong Kong, which was called to break the deadlock in the negotiations. Oxfam generously says it ended with "much still to be done" and the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office says, "some modest progress was made". We are left with possible further WTO meetings in April and July 2006 with an objective of achieving a long-delayed conclusion to the negotiations in 2007. There was a little-noticed Global Governance Summit in South Africa on 12th February. One of the few sources of information about this summit was a Press Conference (details on www.pm.gov/output/Page9045.asp). Something of its flavour is given by the following quotations.

Tony Blair, Prime Minister of UK: "2006 is the year when the world decides whether it is going to be ambitious on world trade, with huge implications for world poverty".

Meles Zenawi, Prime Minister of Ethiopia: "We are moving on; on the economic front this is the third year of double digit growth. We are moving on on the democratic reform front".

President Lula of Brazil: "The Doha Round should not simply discuss the interests of the rich countries or the emerging economy countries. Brazil is committed to making whatever concessions are necessary, proportionally with Brazil’s size and wealth, to ensure that all of us together will take into consideration the need to give preferential treatment to the poorest countries and the least developed countries".

Prime Minister Goran Persson of Sweden: "If we don’t reach an agreement, the multilateral system is questioned. Bilateral agreements between countries on how to regulate trade, that is a disaster, not least for small countries such as my own".

Prime Minister Helen Clarke of New Zealand: "The three big players all have to move, the US on domestic support reduction, the EU on agricultural market access, and the G20 countries on non-agricultural market access". David Bird.

Published by Jack Heery 10 Marlfield Lane Wirral CH61 1AJ 0151 648 1930