Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership

Debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Sarah Wollaston

Thursday 15th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Dr Whiteford). I hope to be able to respond to some of the concerns she voiced. I congratulate the hon. Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) on initiating this important debate.

I share the sentiment, which was expressed by many hon. Members, that trade is the cornerstone of our national wealth. We heard my hon. Friend the Member for North Dorset (Mr Walter) speak about its impact on our economy. Without that trade and our national wealth, there would not be funding for vital services such as our NHS; it is that long-term economic plan that will guarantee its future. However, I would like to speak today about the NHS and express some of my concerns.

The Leader of the Opposition has spoken of his desire to weaponise the NHS. It is shameful in itself, but it also detracts from some of the genuine arguments and important issues that we need to raise about health within TTIP.

Initially, I would like to clear up the points raised by the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan. They are important and I would not support the deal if I thought that it would have the effects she outlined, but I think that they have been rather used as part of that weapon to try to damn this partnership and to damn the Government’s record. That is regrettable.

After reading the letter from the European Commission about the NHS, I wrote back because I wanted to clarify some points. As Chair of the Select Committee on Health, I heard back from Jean-Luc Demarty, the director-general for trade. He wrote to me on 11 December and a copy of that letter is available on the Health Committee’s website if people want to look at it in detail. He made it absolutely clear that all publicly funded health services, including NHS services, would be protected under TTIP.

I pressed him further on that point, asking about the definition of publicly funded health services—in other words, would they include organisations such as those in the third sector? He was very clear that as long as the services are publicly funded, it does not matter how they are delivered. That is an important point of clarity. He also made the point that any investor-state dispute settlement provisions in TTIP could have no impact on the UK’s sovereign right to make changes to the NHS. In other words, that deals with the concerns that have been raised that this is somehow a one-way street and that no future Government would be able to change policy. He is very clear on that point and I urge Members to look at his letter. The issue of ratchet clauses is also very important, and the ratchet clause will not apply in this case.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

If an incoming Government decided to terminate a contract in the NHS or in the public social care sector under which that company claimed that a very large investment had been made in building a care home or something similar, would the company not be able to use TTIP to prosecute the Government for the potential loss of investment?

[Dr Wollaston]

Already within domestic contract law there are provisions that mean that one cannot arbitrarily reverse a contract. A state would be able to announce that it was changing policy and moving forward, but the point about TTIP is that it works on both sides of the Atlantic. We would not wish to have British companies arbitrarily lose their investment in the US. It is about that; it is not some conspiracy of an evil empire, which is how it has been portrayed. I think that that would be a reasonable process.