Trade: Canberra capitulates without firing a salvo
Colin Teese, a former Deputy Secretary of the Department of Trade, looks at Canberra’s capitulation on the Howe Leather case in which Australia displayed its weakness before the world. The World Trade Organisation (WTO) must have been relieved when it was informed of the terms of the settlement reached between the United States and Australia on the matter of Australia’s leather exports to the USA. For the first time the WTO’s dispute settlement procedures seem actually to have been implemented without the aggrieved party rejecting the ruling and suffering punitive trade sanctions. But that is hardly good news. For Australia…