Answer given by Mr De Gucht on behalf of the Commission

11.6.2014

The Commission refers the honourable member to replies E-306/14, E-13215/13 and E-13048/13.

The investment provisions that the EU seeks to negotiate in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) concern fundamental principles, relating to non-discrimination, due process, fairness, and compensation for unlawful expropriations. Those principles are common to the constitutional traditions of all EU Member States and do not pose any threat to democracy.

Under EU and US practice, investment protection standards incorporated into free trade agreements are not directly enforceable before domestic courts; hence an enforcement mechanism has to be in place under the agreement itself.

The EU's approach to investment protection aims at maintaining high standards of protection while addressing the shortcomings of the existing system. EU agreements, including TTIP, will be endowed with the necessary safeguards to ensure that the States’ capacity to regulate in the public interest is not compromised. EU agreements will clarify the language of the standards so that they are not subject to arbitrary interpretations, will explicitly confirm the right of States to regulate and will provide exceptions to protection, including for measures taken in times of crisis. In the public consultation launched by the Commission on investment protection and Investor-state dispute settlement in TTIP, we also explained how these safeguards will work and we included, as examples, the text of the provisions developed in the EU-Canada negotiations.

OJ C 375, 22/10/2014