NHS under threat if Trump gets his UK-US trade deal
The look of love: Theresa May would do anything to ingratiate herself with Donald Trump [Image: Getty Images].
Has everybody already forgotten the aborted ‘TTIP’ (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) deal that would have forced the UK into accepting goods of the lowest standard provided by the US or any country in the EU?
Have we forgotten that the TTIP deal was controversial because it included a so-called ‘Investor-State Dispute Settlement’ system that would have penalised nation states if they made political decisions that could harm the profitability of corporations, who would be freed, effectively to prey on any and all citizens of those nation states?
Britons campaigned vehemently against this system, and the wider deal, because we realised that the Conservative, and Tory-led governments in the UK from 2010 onwards wanted to use it to seal privatisation into the National Health Service.
Once a part of the NHS has been privatised, under the terms of the international trade deal, the UK would not have been able to re-nationalise it without paying huge amounts of compensation to the companies that had bought it.
And now Donald Trump wants a “very big, very powerful” trade deal, solely between the US and the UK. He wants to give American firms another chance to buy the NHS and keep it from ever becoming a solely public service again.
Consider what Mr Trump and Theresa May have been saying about their plans, and you’ll see that their words are very sinister indeed. They have been holding informal talks – in secret – in order to put a deal together as soon as possible after the UK leaves the European Union.
(Bear in mind that it was the EU that vetoed TTIP – David Cameron was UK Prime Minister at the time and he had been fully in support of it, and the NHS privatisation it symbolised.)
“We have been working on a trade deal which will be a very, very big deal, a very powerful deal, great for both countries and I think we will have that done very, very quickly,” said Mr Trump, indicating that there will be no time for anybody to protest against the possibly draconian terms of the deal before it is signed.
And a ‘senior UK government source’ said that before Brexit happens, “every barrier will be lifted to so that when we are ready to go [into a trade agreement with the US] we can do that swiftly and smoothly”.
Now consider all the talk about a US trade deal being a “powerful vote of confidence” in Britain. Isn’t this just propaganda, softening us up so that any dissenting voices can be tarred as unpatriotic?
Look at the way Sir Christopher Meyer, a former British ambassador to Washington, said Mr Trump’s statement of intent was a “very good sign for the future” and would be “useful” to Mrs May.
The balancing comment in the BBC’s article, by Sir Simon Fraser, a former diplomat who served as a permanent under-secretary at the Foreign Office, had nothing to say about whether a deal would be harmful to the interests of UK citizens, but instead cast doubt on how soon any trade deal could be reached.
The Telegraph reported that a member of the British delegation at the G20 said: “We have taken very positive messages away from the meetings we have had here.”
Vox Political would urge all citizens of the UK to treat these warm words with extreme caution.
Talks so far have been in secret – we know nothing about them – just as we knew nothing about the TTIP talks until we demanded the information.
The plan is to enforce a deal very soon after the UK leaves the EU, meaning there will be no time to organise protest against any harmful measures – such as locking private companies into the NHS.
And it seems clear that the intention is to deny the British people any opportunity to contribute to the discussion.
Still, forewarned is forearmed. Let us all do everything we can to drag out the details of this deal.
Trade under good terms is welcome, remember. We need good trading deals. But the UK is in a very weak position at the moment, because of the decision to leave the EU. Other countries will be looking for opportunities to take advantage.
The Conservatives, who have sold our public utility services and railways to foreign countries, are happy to let them.
So it is up to us to defend what is ours.
Join the Vox Political Facebook page.
If you have appreciated this article, don’t forget to share it using the buttons at the bottom of this page. Politics is about everybody – so let’s try to get everybody involved!
Vox Political needs your help!
If you want to support this site
(but don’t want to give your money to advertisers)
you can make a one-off donation here:
Buy Vox Political books so we can continue
fighting for the facts.
The Livingstone Presumption is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
Health Warning: Government! is now available
in either print or eBook format here:
The first collection, Strong Words and Hard Times,
is still available in either print or eBook format here:
Still out on deciding if Trump is just a trojan horse globalist selling false dreams to the rank ‘n file voters. However very clear that the US has already uploaded into the complete control of the NHS one of their very own front runners for complete privatisation. Every NHS asset has also been asset stripped into a fronting company charged with ensuring that the assets of the NHS are flogged off to ensure there will be no going back on any future hospital closures, privatisation takeover deals. They have already wrapped it up and maybe the US Health privateers have already had a word in their mate Trumps ears to speed things up before the Cons lose their fast deteriorating window of opportunity. Yup there is a Cons stentch coming from all this.
Soon after the referendum results were announced an American politician let slip that it was a heaven-sent opportunity for the USA to get its hands on British assets. The Brexiteers never said anything about that in their thoroughly dishonest campaign.
I am just surprised that it has taken so long for this to come to be mentioned officially. This was one of the main reasons that I voted Remain. It was obvious that the Tories would instigate their own personal TTIP as soon as we were out the EU.
What can we do? If the deal is done in secret, then we have no way of knowing how far it will go.
TTIP by the back door was my first thought when I read this.
Then I wondered about the USA cladding manufacturer whose business was badly affected by UK political decisions not to use their sub-standard product after Grenfell – would they be within their rights to sue the UK Government should such a TTIP deal go forward ?
We need to be very wary of Trump acting purely in the USA’s interest and taking advantage of May’s desperation to appear to be in control.
The TTIP global agenda was so devious and biased towards having just a one way greed ticket you would actually be right. They could sue for government interferring with their god given right to sell crap material that their own FM insurers would not use on their own buildings. It would override public safety and lives as the main aim is an interferrence free greed trip. Unfortunately the globalist supporters who reside in power are thick as thieves and until the back lash thought they only had to rubber stamp the pact and the rewards were theirs …. forever….job done. Back door entrances to same deal has to be guarded against and with the slithery Cons in the driving seat anything is possible. Trumpet is not doing this for her benefit or our populations as mentioned they smell an easy open target holding a begging bowl.
Supporters of the NHS campaigned hard and vigorously against the EU US TTIP which was being negotiated by the unelected executive of the eu the commission. It wasn’t only the tories it was every other pro eu supporter in the country who were in favour of letting the eu sell off our NHS.
That’s not true.
In case you have forgotten, it was the EU that vetoed TTIP.