By Clea Guy-Allen

At the grand old age of just 25, Bex Hay is a total pro when it comes to running people powered campaigns against big corporations. Starting as a volunteer at 38 degrees back in 2012, issues around renewable energy, protection of public services and the need for transparency have always been close to her heart.

After taking a few years away from 38 Degrees – heading up ActionAids Tax Havens campaign in 2013, moving to ShareAction to campaign for the divestment of pension funds, the Living Wage for workers at The Ritzy, Tescos and Morrisons AND telling Shell to stop drilling in the Arctic, to then casually starting up AmazonAnonymous, the genius campaign against the companies tax dodging and low paying ways – she’s now back at 38 Degrees, managing their anti-TTIP campaign.

Just returned from a weekend in Brussels where she, along with hundreds of other campaigners from across Europe, went to go and let the EU negotiators know that the EU citizens aren’t buying into the TTIP deal, we decided to check in and see how the campaign is going…

Thank you so much for meeting with Real Media. It is great to be able to speak with such a well regarded organisation about their ongoing campaign against TTIP…

Bex: No worries – it’s great to be able to engage with what Real Media are trying to achieve!

First thing’s first – Why do you think it is that the TTIP agreement between the EU and the US has been kept so under wraps?

Bex: There is a precedent that ‘trade deals’ of this kind are kept under the public radar – they operate under their own rules. And it works for those supporting the deal that there’s limited involvement from ordinary citizens in Europe. The selective interests that negotiate TTIP – carried out by global corporate lobbyists and trade associations – work best in secret, through private back-channels. There isn’t much incentive to open up the deal for public interests to get a look in

There’s a second element to this, which is that politicians who want to spearhead this deal are keen to reach agreement as soon as possible. In the UK, Cameron has declared he wants to put ‘rocket boosters’ under the deal – he’s keen to open the floodgates and let US corporates in, even if the price might mean further privatisation of our public services. The last thing he wants is a huge public backlash and a media spotlight delaying negotiations

38 Degrees is known for running extremely popular and effective campaigns around issues that are already close to their members, and the general public’s hearts – given the largely secretive nature of this agreement, have you found it a challenge to engage people on the issue?

Bex: Overall, no – 38 Degrees members and campaigners from other groups across the UK have been pulling out all the stops to oppose TTIP: whether that’s thousands taking to the streets to leaflet their local areas to the tens of thousands who flooded the EU consultation calling for ISDS – the clause which would allow corporations to sue governments – to be scrapped, and crashing the EU’s website in the process!

There are challenges to campaigning against TTIP that come down to the secretive nature of the deal, and just the sheer level of influence that corporate lobbyists can wield with enough money and enough lawyers in Brussels. But really, TTIP goes to the core of a lot of what 38 Degrees members value the most: democracy, people having power over corporations, protecting our public services from privatisation – not being at the mercy of vested interests or private profit. TTIP threatens so much that we value, so for that reason 38 Degrees members want to stop this deal at all costs.

The first bones of an agreement were being decided way back in 2011, as a result of the financial crash, however the first thing the public heard about it was when the draft proposal was leaked to the german media in 2014 – why do you think it took so long for the story to get out?

Bex: Trade deals and European negotiations aren’t the stuff of big media headlines – when you look at the effects of TTIP and the huge impact it could have on our lives, that’s when it starts to look dangerous. But it takes a whistleblower or a big expose to get there and for people to start hearing about it, which is why the leaks to the German media last year were so useful. Without that happening, TTIP could be much further along in the negotiation process than it is right now.

In general though, when you look at the way the media works in the UK, who owns it, who advertises in it and who writes for it, it’s not surprising that a deal that could potentially benefit those at the top isn’t getting the coverage it needs…

On the subject of media, have you noticed a difference in the response to TTIP across Europe compared to here in the UK? Some people have commented that it almost feels like there’s been a small blackout here…

Bex: Yes, the media in the UK has been slower to react than in France or Germany. Over here it’s really been down to the people campaigning on the ground against TTIP that has thrust the issue into a media spotlight

By not covering the agreement though, the media are just stoking the fire. Our members want to know what’s happening and by denying that, or only releasing small pieces of information ultimately it is going to make people more passionate about getting to the truth.

We saw an example of this last week, when the BBC leaked a document from TTIP that appears to confirm one of our worst fears about the deal – that our NHS is not explicitly exempt. But coverage in other media outlets? Nothing.

In a New Statesman article from last year, writer Dan Holden argued that TTIP was the “biggest threat to democracy you’ve never heard of” – do you agree with this statement?

Bex: There’s a lot of truth in that sentiment. There’s already plenty that’s been said about this deal threatening our sovereignty: being dealt in secret and so far removed from elected politicians who want to raise concerns about it.

And the bigger threat to democracy is if you look at some of the implications of TTIP – in particular, the ISDS clause that could see corporations suing governments for policies that damage their profit, or which could prevent us reversing privatisation of public services. That’s trampling all over our rights to have a say and dictate how we run our public services, how we treat the most vulnerable in our society, and how we put safeguards in place to protect our wildlife and our food standards.

TTIP is talked about as a ‘trade deal’, but it would be more accurate to describe it as a consolidation of power – for corporations and for politicians who wish to look out for private profit above that or even at the cost of peoples’ interest. The only thing that’s being traded here is our democracy.

A huge part of the fear surrounding TTIP is obviously the element of the ‘unknown’. You recently went to Brussels with other campaign organisations from across the EU – have you had any feedback from the EU Commission since then about the progress of the agreement?

Bex: TTIP is now in the ‘8th’ round of negotiations, with more running into the summer and late 2015. But that’s a bit misleading: it’s the eighth round for European officials and lobbyists in Brussels, but we have yet to have any kind of say on it.

Some parts of the deal have been disrupted – after the consultation with 97% of submissions in the UK overwhelmingly against corporations being allowed to sue governments, the EC announced it has ‘suspended’ that part of the deal. It’s likely they are just waiting for the fuss to die down to bring it back, and we’ve probably still got a fight on our hands. A representative from the government’s Business committee implied to MPs this week that ISDS could be back on the table again in July

Some of our MEP representatives in the EU and a few MPs have told us that they share ‘concerns’ about the deal – but really, our politicians have a long way to go if they’re going to take firm action to stop this deal. Many of them are still sitting on the fence, and it’s up to us to get them off it before they come to vote on TTIP in May and after the General Election.

For those who might not understand the full expanse of what TTIP covers in terms of regulations, for you, what’s the biggest issue the UK needs to focus on?

Bex: The NHS springs to mind first. There’s a particular threat to us if TTIP goes through that yet more of our NHS services could be opened up for companies to cherry pick the ones they want to carve up. The NHS as a free at point of use service, in public hands, is of course one of the things we treasure most in the UK: we all need the NHS at some of our best and worst times in life, so it’s natural this is one of the most important things we want to protect from TTIP. The fact that our NHS is already at risk from our government’s privatisaion, with contracts being tendered already to private companies, makes it all the more urgent that we don’t slip further away from the NHS we all want to see.

That’s not to say that the NHS is the only public service at threat – and it is one of many barriers to corporate interference that could be eroded by TTIP. The deal is dangerous by its very premise, and that’s why we need to our politicians to take a stand and stop TTIP, rather than just campaign for loose adjustments.

Can you think of an example that really shows the potential devastation that TTIP could reek on the UK’s autonomy to self govern?

Bex: Something about Phillip Morris in Australia and implications on corporates coming before public health etc.

What do you think about the global potential for the campaign against TTIP and similar trade agreements that have been put into effect?

Bex: The scale of opposition to TTIP, and its US and Canadian counterparts CETA and TPP, is a great demonstration of potential for people power to come together across different borders that hasn’t been seen before or for a long time.

When we campaign and mobilise in our local areas we are always stronger together, and that’s why the combined force of public outcry in Germany, France, Austria and other European nations against TTIP has been so great to see. We’re up against some of the most powerful vested corporate interests in the world, but they don’t have the mass of people power with them and that’s why we stand a chance of defeating these deals

We were at the Global Justice Now summit in London last weekend and TTIP was mentioned a lot. One of the main questions was whether there was a need for a global movement of people, and if so, what were they fighting for, or against. The obvious answer to most people was climate change, the other was transparency, but then there was a real moment of clarity when people connected that many of the problems the world faces aren’t to do with the overall outcomes, but the drivers of the issues, and TTIP was recognised as being one of the cornerstones that demonstrates just how much power corporates have accumulated and how far reaching the impact could be. With that said – do you think agreements between corporates and governments, such as TTIP, are exemplifying a dramatic change in the way the world governs, or of it’s just that relationships and negotiations are only now being made more public because of the strong fight from the left around transparency and whistleblowing?

Bex: TTIP certainly isn’t happening in a vacuum – it represents a microcosm of what happens when power is concentrated in the hands of the super-rich, and in governments that wish to further these interests.

Evidence doesn’t suggest that this is a dramatic new course we weren’t on before – it’s more that TTIP will turbo-charge a trend we’re already seeing in many European countries: creeping privatisation of public services, erosion of regulation and safeguards, fewer democratic channels for people to exercise their rights. That’s not the world most of us want to see, or the kind of society we would vote for, so that’s why we’re seeing such an uprising of public anger towards this deal.

Do you think that if TTIP get’s through, it could have an impact on wider issue areas that people are concerned about such as renewable energy, food production and rising inequality due to governments being backed into a corner over deregulation of contracts/subsidies/workers rights, or are people over hyping it?

Yes, it could definitely have an impact. From what I’ve seen, this concern is not over-hyped from the evidence that has come out, and from experience of previous agreements like this. You just have to look at the way that corporations have behaved in the past, like Phillip Morris, to know that if an American fossil fuel company decided to invest and set up in the UK as a result of this agreement, and then in 5/10/15 years time we vote in a government who bans the sale of non-renewable energy, because of the ISDS clause, our government could be sued by the corporation for their loss of earnings. The potential choke-hold this agreement could have on our democratic freedom as voters and our democratic autonomy as a government is quite worrying.

That feels like a very ominous way to leave an interview so, to end on a high, what’s the best way for people to effectively participate in this campaign?!

Bex: There’s still a lot we can, and need to do to defeat this deal. The more people who get involved, and the more we do to spread the word on TTIP the more powerful our opposition will be: 50% of the public still haven’t heard about the deal or know what it means, so let’s get out on the streets and raise the alarm

The next two months is also a great chance to pressure our elected representatives – and MP candidates – to also oppose TTIP. They will be voting on the deal so we need them to remember they represent us, not the corporate lobbyists who pay for their attention.

If you haven’t taken part in the campaign yet, you can get started by signing the European-wide petition to stop TTIP and CETA which now has over a million signatures.

Check out the 38 Degrees website and sign up to get involved in days of action and activity in your local area. Also keep the 18th April free in your diary for the Global Day of Action against TTIP!

Thanks for your time Bex, it’s been educational to say the least – good luck with the campaign!