Get Ready To Fight: CETA up for OK, Ratification Within Two Weeks

On Tuesday I wrote in 38 Degrees Manchester's blog about the court case brought by German activists against the provisional application of the FTA on the grounds that it's unconstitutional. Today they lost. What happens now?

Our German friends lost their case on narrow grounds; CETA can be provisionally applied but within limitations that include ISDS and the setting up of an investment court system as proposed by Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström; they won't be able to do much with it. This is just as well because even the provisional application could leave us stuck with this albatross around our necks for twenty years.

What does this mean?

Well the whole point of provisionally applying CETA was to calm jittery Europeans who were being won over by the hue and cry over ISDS, etc. It's like when you get a new cat and leave it in its box behind the sofa, then leave a bowl of food and a litter box nearby. Kitty gets used to his new surroundings and comes out to play. Same idea. The Irish are having none of it; they voted against the provisional application on Thursday 6th October — the motion passed by one vote.

What can we do?

CETA is about to be voted on at the Council of European Union in Luxembourg on October 18th and, if agreed, signed on October 27th at the summit between the EU and Canada. Take part in this campaign by Another Europe Is Possible: contact your MP and MEP and ask them to vote against it when it comes up for approval. We can kill CETA as well as we killed ACTA and if we do so it'll take TTIP down with it. Two unfair trade agreements with one act of defiance — what's not to love? Let's do this!