Remarks on Economic Justice
Date: 23 Nov 2005
Speaker: Secretary-General Don McKinnon
Location: Commonwealth People's Forum, Malta
It is always a pleasure to attend the People's Forum. I tried to do so on Sunday, but I'm afraid that bad weather delayed my departure from London and thus my arrival here.
I am pleased to know that the Forum nevertheless got off to such a good start, and has been such a success. I am also pleased to have found this alternative opportunity to come to see you. Because the work of this Forum is an integral part of the CHOGM.
Your discussion this morning about economic justice is an important subject. So, too, will be your discussion tomorrow about tolerance. That is a subject that will be on the minds of Heads of Government later this week.
Terrorist attacks in recent times have brought tolerance to the top of the public agenda. And one cannot be one-dimensional about it: the roots of terrorism may be found in faith, ethnicity, culture, nationality, socio-economic marginalisation, and even straightforward political beliefs and ends. Similarly, one needs to tackle terrorism, extremism, and exclusion in an equally varied way. Tolerance is the key.
So, I will be very interested to hear the outcomes of that session of this People's Forum tomorrow.
And let me pay special tribute to the Commonwealth Foundation which lies behind this Forum. Both the Foundation and the Commonwealth Secretariat were established 40 years ago.
It was visionary of leaders at that time in particular to form the Foundation. It reflected a desire at the most senior political levels to draw in civil society to the heart of the Commonwealth's work. That is something the Foundation continues to do very successfully.
CHOGMs used to last about 8 days and just involve Heads of Government and their officials. Now they still last about 8 days but they involve many more players than just Heads and their officials. There is a whole Commonwealth family of organisations that meets.
These gatherings also used to be known as Commonwealth Prime Ministers Meetings. That changed in 1971. Perhaps, 34 years later, it may be time to come up with a new name and acronym to reflect how the CHOGM week has changed.
One of the things I wanted to say in this Forum on Sunday, and which I continue to say as often as possible is that civil society organisations - you - perform a vital role within the Commonwealth. You are valued because you contribute to the realisation of our shared goals: you add value to people's participation in the democratic process. And where democracies flourish, the conditions exist for economic opportunity and growth.
You also contribute, at national and international levels, to the debate on how to eliminate poverty and how to tackle economic injustice. And there certainly is enough of that, which we in the Commonwealth encounter on an almost daily basis.
The Millennium Development Goals set out a plan to build a safer, fairer and more prosperous world. What we know is that about 11 of our Commonwealth members have made some progress; about 11 have probably gone backward from where they should be; and the rest are somewhere in between.
That is not satisfactory.
What we need is for donor governments to honour their pledges and commitments. There were some significant steps forward this year, notably with the pledges on debt elimination and aid increases. We should not be ungenerous in acknowledging that those were positive advances.
0.7 per cent of GNP is what developed nations pledged, and they also committed to sustained commitment on debt relief and opening the space for economic opportunity. That was a good deal further than I would have thought possible looking at this situation and the needs only two or three years ago.
As I have been saying as often as possible since the G8 summit and the EU and US pledging rounds in the last half year, what is needed now is delivery, delivery, delivery.
If we really want economic justice, then it is a matter of living up to those commitments. Globalisation offers unprecedented opportunities for creating prosperity for all. However, it does also need to be managed if globalisation is to deliver the choices on which to build that prosperity.
The Doha Development Agenda can also be a major contributor. I acknowledge that trade is not the only way forward, but I do believe it is one of the best. We want to have the conditions in which people can produce products and services in their neighbourhoods, and then market them and sell them profitably.
If one wants to get beyond simple subsistence, then making a surplus and being able to sell it, fundamentally, is how to get rapidly and successfully beyond subsistence…and ideally without the crutch of lasting external assistance even if shorter term assistance is merited.
Open markets are fundamental to that. Without doubt, they offer an opportunity for many millions in the world to escape from poverty.
Sometimes, the case for open international trade comes under scrutiny. But peel back the layers of rhetoric and politics which often cloud Geneva and those WTO talks. Bear in mind the incredibly complex task involved in reconciling the national economic interests of almost all the world's economic entities, and hence the challenge of agreeing a trade Round.
Do that, and one can see two things clearly - that all acknowledge the value of trade in tackling economic disparity; and that a just outcome is very hard to define let alone achieve.
In February this year, we in the Secretariat launched a year of intensive activity at the political level to secure Commonwealth support for the Doha Round. That activity will culminate at the WTO talks in Hong Kong in three weeks' time.
The message we have been conveying - and still are - is:
(a) that the membership of the WTO has increased and changed, so those old-style negotiating tactics from the Uruguay Round and before won't work the same way any more. The old hands at the negotiating table need to know that;
(b) that unless developed countries are willing to give more than they get, and offer real development dividends, there is a high risk that developing countries will walk away. They have already done so, as you'll recall at Cancun , and they'll do so again. For them, no deal is better than a bad deal - and I have a great deal of sympathy for that.
And (c), that there is a role for the Commonwealth in driving forward the political agenda, pursuing a high level of ambition.
Frankly, having talked to Pascal Lamy a few days ago and others close to the talks, there is now a high level of despondency and a low level of ambition for the Doha Round. The current WTO Round is unlike any Round before and the negotiations are in more serious trouble than ever before.
But developing countries did not get a deal on agriculture in the Uruguay Round. We said at the end of that Round that we would attend to developing country needs and to agriculture next time. Now is the next time.
And therefore developing countries should receive more than they are expected to give in the Doha Round, especially on agriculture, before trade-offs occur in the other areas such as services and rules.
Ladies and Gentlemen, as I said yesterday to the Commonwealth Business Forum, this week is going to be a test of the Commonwealth leadership. If Heads this weekend can come out with a clear political message to their negotiating teams to maintain a high level of ambition, then our 53 leaders may be able to give the WTO the shot in the arm it requires at this critical moment. And our organisation will have shown its worth.
We account in the Commonwealth for one fifth of global trade, so we have a legitimate right and a responsibility to show leadership.
I encourage you, as partners in the drive for economic growth and prosperity in the Commonwealth, to add your voice in getting that outcome from this CHOGM. That will be the best sort of contribution we can make to genuine economic justice.
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Remarks on Economic Justice
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