During a debate in the French Senate, all political parties harshly
criticized the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP),
but the French government defended the potential deal,
EurActiv France reports.
The
minister in charge of foreign trade, Nicole Bricq, admit with regret
that France was the country where the mobilisation against what they
call the 'transatlantic treaty', is the strongest.
A
debate, which took place in the Senate on Thursday (9 January), showed
bipartisan opposition to the agreement and the government found itself
somewhat isolated on the topic after facing criticism from
speakers from all political sides.
he
former French interior minister, Jean-Pierre Chevènement, reminded that
the idea for a partnership was first and foremost an American idea, as
the US wished to rebalance the trade surplus that the EU had with the
country and bring back jobs to their continent.
“The
companies’ interests are not always those of the states," warned a
politician, who considers that the currency issue should have been
settled before signing a trade agreement.
“We should
have put in place a transatlantic snake in the tunnel in order to
establish, softly, a real parity between the euro and the dollar. We
cannot talk about free trade when the parity between euro and
dollar go from one to two in ten years only.”
In his opinion, this aspect should be included in the negotiations, but the minister Bricq replied it was not on the agenda.
André
Gattolin, a Green MP, also strongly opposed the partnership project,
said that Europe had its own identity and should preserve it. He also
put forward the impact it would have on inequality in different European
countries.
“We are promised 0.5% growth but only some
zones will take advantage of it like the ports of Rotterdam and
Antwerp,” the MP went on to say.
“As it is, this project is bad and we saw with the NSA scandal that the dice are loaded,” he added.
Jean
Bizet from the centre-right opposition, UMP, expressed concern about
the food and agriculture aspects of the deal and notably the milk file,
as cheese imports increase in France and milk producing regions grow
anxious at the end of milk quotas in 2015.
The sharpest remark came from a member of the government's socialist majority, Marie-Noëlle Lienemann.
“I am very hostile to this treaty,” she said. “We are
forced to note that happy globalisation did not happen! … multinational
companies are in a situation that we cannot regulate,” she added.
The
MP was sceptical about the growth perspectives, too. She added that the
promised growth points could be reached with a recovery policy
supported by large-scale work projects.
Read more: French senators strongly attack EU-US trade deal | EurActiv