Select committee: International Agreements Committee
Recommendation 11
4th Report - Scrutiny of international agreements: UK-Australia free trade agreement
Published 23 Jun 2022
Paragraph 42
International Agreements Committee UK-Australia trade negotiations All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
However, Government policy towards investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS)—though not included in this agreement—remains unclear. We call on the Government to clarify its policy towards ISDS, including its position on other mechanisms for investment protection. The absence of a clear policy begs the question whether the omission of ISDS in this agreement was sought by the Government, or whether it assented to an Australian request to exclude it.
From: International Agreements Committee, 4th Report - Scrutiny of international agreements: UK-Australia free trade agreement, paragraph 42, 23 June 2022
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 5 September 2022 (deadline 5 September 2022).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government welcomes the Committee's report and responds to its recommendations in turn, setting out its existing approach and some specific commitments, while declining to pre-empt future negotiations on matters such as ISDS.
- On monitoring, the Department "has committed to publishing a comprehensive ex-post evaluation" of the UK-Australia FTA "within five years of its entry into force", and a biennial monitoring report that will include measuring utilisation.
- On emissions, it says negotiating GHG reductions in trade agreements would be "neither practical nor coherent", as this is handled through UNFCCC and inter-Governmental environment agreements.
- On scrutiny, the Department "will make Ministers and senior officials available to privately discuss prospective negotiations with the Committee, before negotiations are launched", expected during the public consultation period.
- On the devolved administrations, it says its involvement is "already in line with the committee's recommendation", but that "it would not be appropriate for the Government to report directly on their views".