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“TRADE AND LABOR” mentioning the U.S. Dept of State was published in the Extensions of Remarks section on pages E1123-E1124 on May 23, 2007.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
TRADE AND LABOR
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speech of
HON. LINDA T. SANCHEZ
of california
in the house of representatives
Monday, May 21, 2007
Ms. LINDA T. SANCHEZ of California. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join my colleagues in addressing the House and the American people regarding our trade policy and its effect on working families.
I'd like to thank my colleague, Phil Hare, who organized this special order debate and who is an active member of the Congressional Labor and Working Families Caucus and the House Trade Working Group.
On May 10, the Administration and Members of this House announced a
``New Policy on Trade.''
It's about time. Democrats have been calling for a new direction in trade for years. Finally, the Administration appears to be listening to these calls for improved provisions to protect workers, their families, and the environment. I applaud the baby steps the Administration has taken. But the Administration needs to take giant leaps to improve on its current, failing approach to trade.
This new ``deal'' on trade covers changes to certain provisions of the Bush-negotiated Free Trade Agreements, FTAs, with Peru and Panama. Though we have seen outlines and summaries of this new ``deal'' on trade, we have not seen the final, legal text. Yet we have been asked to trust the Administration's promises and support this new ``deal.''
To those of us in Congress who have been working to champion the rights of American working families and begin a new approach to trade, the Administration's promises sound awfully familiar.
And when I say awful, I mean awful.
Each time this Administration has presented one of its trade schemes to Congress, it has promised us that the agreement includes all sorts of so-called ``innovative'' worker protections. We heard this over and over again during the debate on the Central American Free Trade Agreement.
But the fact is, no matter what label you use to describe them, the so-called labor protections in CAFTA were disappointingly weak. For example, under CAFTA, countries can down-grade their own labor laws, without facing any trade penalties or sanctions.
Allowing our partners in free trade deals to erode their own labor standards is unfair to our workers here at home, who can't possibly compete with workers who are denied basic workplace rights, who are paid two dollars a day, or who face forced labor--as our own State Department reported was the case in Oman.
CAFTA passed the House by the narrowest of margins at a time when it was Republican controlled. You would think that the Administration would have gotten the message that it needed to do better.
You would think the Administration would have realized that from then on, it should include more of us in the process and work out a different type of trade deal.
But unfortunately no one was listening. Since CAFTA, we've seen the same weak labor provisions in the Oman FTA.
And now we are asked to have faith that the Administration has really turned over a new leaf? That enforceable labor and environmental standards will be included in the text of the Peru and Panama agreements?
I have faith in many things, but not in these promises.
This Administration has lost my faith. It has lied too many times, about too many things: that Iraq posed an imminent danger, that the mission in Iraq was accomplished, that at least nine U.S. attorneys were fired because they were incompetent, that the air around ground zero was safe to breathe, that we have not been experiencing any change in our climate.
Perhaps more importantly, even if these agreements are the best written, fairest trade agreements possible, so long as they rely on this Administration to enforce the labor and environmental standards they contain, they are not worth the paper they are written on.
This Administration has failed to protect workers here in the United States. The BP Texas City explosion, the Sago Mine Disaster, and the 9/
11 first responders and clean-up workers who have developed serious breathing ailments--these are just the most notorious examples of this Administration's relinquishment of its responsibilities to provide even the most basic protection to workers: the right to work in a safe environment.
And that's not even mentioning the Administration's opposition to increasing the minimum wage, to protecting pensions and Social Security, and to ensuring that workers have the right to organize.
The Bush trade deal would give private corporations the ability to take action on their own to protect their rights. It would not, however, extend that same power to workers, who would have to rely on the Bush Administration to do that for them.
Trust this Administration to protect working American families? I don't think so. This new trade deal--like the previous bad deals--is a one-sided raw deal for workers.
We're continually told that NAFTA-style free trade will create more wealth in all the countries involved. Yet NAFTA-style free trade has meant the loss of jobs as those jobs have been shipped overseas.
Just as trickle-down economics proved to be a failure at lifting people out of poverty, the current free trade model has also proved to be a failure. Since NAFTA, the real income of working families has been on the decline or stagnant at best.
The middle class is getting squeezed from all directions. Downward pressure on wages is being accompanied by higher health care costs, higher gas prices, and higher education costs.
It's high time to develop a new trade policy that works for working families. American workers came out in droves in the last election, and they voted for a new majority. As part of the new majority, we owe it to them to stand with them for fair trade. To stand with them in creating a new America.
This is possible.
Fair trade is an option.
If we stand united for working Americans, we can deliver a real new deal on trade, not warmed over hash masquerading as caviar. You know the old saying about putting lipstick on a pig? Well, I smell bacon. I don't have to read the complete text of the deal to read between the lines.
The bottom line is this: minor adjustments to NAFTA-style deals are not good enough.
No more agreements based on the failed NAFTA model.
No more ``Fast Track'' trade negotiation authority.
We cannot give this Administration or future ones a blank check on trade deals that devastate our communities.
Trade can benefit our economy and the economies of our trading partners. We can negotiate deals that create new markets, bringing new jobs and new prosperity. We can achieve significant new foreign market access and reduce our trade deficit.
But to do so, we must embark on a new path. Not a slight detour from our current direction.
I challenge Republicans and Democrats, employers and employees, all those who care about shared prosperity in this country, and not just the rich getting richer, to work together to embark on this entirely new journey to fair trade.
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