Education should be exempted from trade deal

Commenting today as negotiators from the European Union (EU) and US meet in Brussels to discuss the proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the union said that the deal poses a profound threat to public services in the UK, including education.
 
By relaxing regulatory controls on foreign investment, the agreement could potentially open public services up to greater privatisation by overseas investors, and make it more difficult for the UK government to regulate private US companies operating in our public services.
 
In particular, the inclusion of an 'Investor-State Dispute Settlement' mechanism would potentially allow for-profit companies to challenge legislation designed to protect the public interest.  The union is therefore arguing that public services, including all forms of education, should be exempt from the trade deal.
 
UCU general secretary, Sally Hunt, said: 'We understand that it is important to look at new ways of doing business with other countries, and to remove unnecessary barriers to investment in the European Union. However, our public services are fundamentally different to private enterprise, and so they should be treated separately when it comes to making deals with the US and other nations.
 
'The UK higher education sector is already a priority for many for-profit US education companies, some of whom have an unsavoury reputation for aggressive marketing and poor-quality provision. Reducing our government's ability to regulate these companies and allowing them to challenge policies designed to protect the public interest would be an outrage.
 
'That's why we're asking UK politicians to put pressure on those discussing the TTIP in Brussels this week to exempt all public services, including education, from the deal.'