. – The decision to withhold consent on the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) was taken after considerable thought on the relative merits of the deal and only after its final form emerged from the negotiations. On balance, I could not give my assent to the process or the content of the treaty, primarily over concerns that:
•The Investor Court System, while admittedly improved, will still undermine general corporate law by developing a supranational court;
•Continuing concerns over the right of the Scottish Parliament to decide on future regulatory standards, especially on environmental and food safety, had not been adequately addressed by the UK in the CETA text;
•The opening of government procurement, while welcome, did not adequately safeguard the right of the Scottish Parliament to decide on future public services, given the operation of the present and future devolved settlement;
•The European protection of Scottish food and fisheries products was insufficiently represented due to the failure of the UK Government to put this forward in the text;
•There remain significant shortcomings in the way that the European Commission has handled the conduct of the negotiations.
