Bill Shorten warns Labor Left on trade deal dissent

Bill Shorten has warned Labor’s Left faction to drop its opposition to free-trade deals on industrial relations grounds.

Labor trade spokesman Jason Clare announced new measures to protect workers. Picture: Justin Brierty.

Bill Shorten has warned Labor’s Left faction to drop its opposition to free-trade deals on industrial relations grounds, as caucus yesterday defied the trade union movement and vocal internal ­critics to back the government in ratifying the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement.

Labor MPs agreed to back the TPP-11 without a formal caucus vote as trade spokesman Jason Clare announced new measures to protect workers and national sovereignty in future trade deals, and improve transparency of agreements by parliament, industry and unions.

Legislation to give effect to the TPP-11 is now assured of passing parliament, after an earlier threat by the Centre Alliance to block the bill in the Senate.

The deal will give Australian businesses preferential market ­access to the new Asian and South American trading bloc with a combined 500 million consumers.

Labor caucus agreed to support the deal after a heated debate involving about 23 speakers — a “slight majority” of whom spoke against the deal.

Supporters ­argued that Donald Trump’s retreat from the TPP “increases the strategic argument for Australia to ­engage”, despite Mr Shorten’s declaration last year that the US withdrawal meant it was “dead in the water”.

Those speaking against the deal included former union officials Ged Kearney, Doug Cam­eron, Pat Conroy, Glenn Sterle and Alex Gallacher.

They argued that Australians would face unfair competition from overseas workers, that there were insufficient safeguards to prevent exploitation, and that the Liberals had used trade agreements to deregulate the labour market.

A motion to reject the bill to ratify the agreement on the grounds it was against Labor policy was rejected. Treasury spokesman Chris Bowen, defence spokesman Richard Marles, foreign affairs spokeswoman Penny Wong and assistant Treasury spokesman Andrew Leigh were among those who spoke in favour of the bill.

The Opposition Leader spoke out after the debate, declaring “no trade agreement will solve the ­industrial relations problems in Australia”, and urging “unity, stability and focus” from the party ahead of the election.

Mr Clare confirmed Labor would require labour market testing before future trade agreements were signed, while the party would reject agreements that included so-called “investor-state dispute settlement” provisions giving foreign investors the right to sue the government over policy decisions.

New measures would also require the joint standing committee on treaties to be briefed by the government at the end of each round of trade negotiations, and legislation requiring an independent national interest assessment to be conducted on every new agreement, examining its economic, strategic and social impact.

ACTU president Michele O’Neil had previously warned that the TPP-11 was “a bad deal for working people”.

Trade Minister Simon Birmingham said he welcomed the “constructive” statements from Labor, saying this was in “stark contrast” to some crossbenchers.

Former trade minister Steven Ciobo signed the TPP-11 in March.