Austria softens rhetoric against trade deal with Canada

Austria softened its opposition to a free trade deal between the European Union and Canada on Friday, according to a report by Reuters.

Two days earlier, Kern had vowed to start a ‘conflict’ over the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between the EU and Canada.

Nonetheless, the real target of his remarks, which reflect similar concerns from other EU countries, was a much bigger trading deal with the United States called the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP).

Thus, on Friday Kern launched a campaign with the aim of informing his party’s members about both trade deals by inviting experts and decision makers to take part in the debate. Party members would then be able to vote for or against certain parts of the deals online and by telephone in order to help the government form its position.

"The cleanest path would be to renegotiate, but I believe... that will be difficult. Apart from us almost nobody wants to completely reopen this cask" said Kern.

The concerns Kern had with the deals is that they might allow companies to challenge government policies when they believe they are being put at a disadvantage by regulations. He also felt that companies might compromise social and environmental standards as well as food safety standards in Europe. His aim was to work towards giving national parliaments as much as authority as feasible over investment disputes and environmental and social standards.

The European Commission hoped governments in the EU could approve CETA before the end of October.

To take note of, Vice-Chancellor Reinhold Mitterlehner had recently called for a stop to TTIP negotiations until after the US presidential elections in November, starting from scratch.