43c/RCom/Report2 Annex 3
Emergency motion 4: ITF Position on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)
The 43rd Congress of the ITF, meeting in Sofia, Bulgaria from 10-‐16 August 2014:
1. Notes that the International Transport Workers Federation (ITF) represents 700 national trade unions from 150 countries, and defends the interests of more than 4.7 million members all over the globe.
2. In response to the negotiating mandate given to the parties (EU and USA) to negotiate a Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), with the aim of further liberalising trade between the EU and US, ITF adopts the following position.
3. ITF takes note of reports on the potential benefits of an agreement of this magnitude, including enhanced diversity, an improved global regulatory framework, investment flows and growth that could help improve the situation for workers in the aftermath of the financial crisis, and for regaining the momentum of stalled multilateral talks. However, ITF notes that even the most ambitious projections released by the European Commission about job creation and growth are modest. Moreover, ITF notes that the EU and US are already relatively open towards each other in terms of investment and trade, as reflected in existing low tariffs. ITF also advocates fair trade and sustainable globalisation and calls for negotiators to mitigate negative consequences should the TTIP reduce trade within the EU internal market with southern Member States or with other EU trading partners from the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP) or least developed countries (LDC).
4. ITF demands that the following two conditions are fulfilled before the negotiations proceed. Firstly, the investor-‐state dispute settlement mechanism (ISDS) must be excluded from the negotiations, given that both the EU and US have mature legal systems. Companies should not be given so much power over national law and politics. The countries themselves must be able to take political decisions without being afraid of a multi-‐national companies taking the state to court. Secondly, ITF calls for the agreement to include legally binding recognition of ILO core labour standards and minimum EU standards on social and labour rights to avoid social dumping. To this end, EU negotiators should demand that their US counterparts ratify all ILO core labour standards. European and national laws and regulations containing provisions on social security, collective bargaining, working time, employment conditions, public health, information and consultation rights and other protections should not be considered as non-‐tariff barriers to trade and must not be challenged by the TTIP.
5. ITF calls on the European Commission and their US counterpart to conduct transparent negotiations that include timely and comprehensive consultation of the European social partners for transport, so that they may assess the likely impacts of the TTIP in their sectors.
6. ITF calls for the transport sector to be recognised as a crucial sector that ensures industrial growth and as such must have a special position in the TTIP negotiations.
7. ITF approaches claims made by the European Commission about job gains with caution, in particular as regards the quality of jobs to be created, and holds that market opening offers should not be made until a rigorous sustainability impact assessment including social and environmental criteria has been undertaken in consultation with the social partners.
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