Video: I Speak to RT about the Dangers of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) + My Photos of the London Protest

See the video below and see my photos on Flickr here.

On Saturday October 11, 2014, I attended a protest in Parliament Square, opposite the Houses of Parliament in London, against the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), a dangerous new EU-US trade deal, which, if passed, as the organisers of the London event explained, “would grant corporations the power to sue governments, threatening to lock-in the privatisation of our schools and NHS. Rules that protect workers, the environment, food safety, digital rights and privacy would be undermined, with harmful industries like fracking encouraged.” My article published just before the protest is here.

The London event was part of a day of action across Europe and the UK, and the events across all the countries were attended by a significant number of people, although only a few hundred people attended the London event, sharing Parliament Square with Kurdish campaigners.

I was delighted to speak to RT’s Harry Fear in Parliament Square for a televised broadcast, which is available below, and if you like it I hope you share it.

As I explained to RT, the defenders of TTIP try to assure us that we have nothing to worry about, but as these are essentially the same people who, for 30 years, have been transferring power to corporations and banks at the expense of the people — and from hugely important public services like the NHS — it is foolish for anyone to think that they have our best interests at heart.

Never underestimate the greed — and the disdain for the general public — that motivate those who would stand above us, and who regard themselves as superior.  The purpose of so-called “liberalising” trade agreements, after all, is to liberalise profiteering for the few, while eroding workers’ rights.

I hope, in the months to come, that more people see through the lies, and, in England in particular, will not continue to be taken in by the lies peddled by the corrupt media’s latest darlings, UKIP, and their leader, Nigel Farage, who is very much part of the problem and not the solution he pretends to be when he’s seen, as he is so often, propping up a bar somewhere. As a former international commodities trader, it is obvious where Farage’s real sympathies lie — with those in power, and not with the people. Like TTIP, he and his party of bigots should be shunned.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer and film-maker. He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here – or here for the US).

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