G8 SUMMIT IN COLOGNE * Summit Time. The annual Heads of State gathering of the G8 countries (Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States begins this weekend at Cologne, in Germany. The G8 Summit follows a meeting of the EU Council summit, also in Cologne. Besides German proposals for a European charter of human rights, the EU leaders have been trying to decide on an �employment pact�. Martin Walker of The Guardian reports that now the controversial German finance minister Oskar Lafontaine � known in the press as Red Oskar � has resigned from office, the measures within the �employment pact� have changed considerably. Walker: �When Lafontaine was finance minister, the pact might have meant shorter working weeks, EU-wide public works projects and the kind of Keynesian policies that worry central bankers. But now that Red Oskar is gone, Britain has managed to get this recast as an employment and economic reform pact, with deregulated labour markets and greater job flexibility. The dream of leftwing Europe is fast turning into the reality of a Blairite Third Way...� JUBILEE 2000 CAMPAIGN * The big issue at this weekend�s G8 summit will be the question of addressing the massive debt-levels of the least-developed countries. The Jubilee 2000 campaign � put together by an international coalition of church and community activists � made a significant impact on last year�s G8 Summit in Birmingham, and has worked hard to keep the issue on the agenda again this year. The campaign is currently running in over 50 countries around the world, and their goal is to bring tens of thousands of people and millions of signatures to Cologne on June 19th. * At an April 1999 G7 meeting, newly enthused world leaders gave moving pledges to the cause of debt relief and an end to poverty. US Vice President Al Gore, and German leader Gerhard Shroeder were taken aback by the strength of feeling generated by Jubilee 2000�s campaign and the sheer number of people pressing for change. They reversed their previous positions on the issue and seemed to promise some real results. British Finance Minister Gordon Brown has also been pushing measures to raise the levels of debt that the G8 countries will be prepared to write off. But, like the �employment pact� of the recent EU Summit ... the rhetoric looks likely to fall very short of delivering real results. Our Media Watch reports that Gordon Brown has not had much support in his proposals from British PM Tony Blair. There is also Italian, German and Japanese opposition to �generous� debt-relief proposals. * Those countries defined by the World Bank and IMF as "Heavily Indebted Poor Countries" (HIPC) owe $216 billion and, according to the World Bank and IMF, are not making any payments on $100 billion of this. Realistically, this $100 billion will never be repaid, and Jubilee 2000 says that cancellation of these debts therefore will cost nothing because there is no expectation of repayment. The initial G8 promises were to cancel $25 billion of these uncollectable debts. The proposals from this weekend�s G8 meeting in Cologne are expected to raise this to $50 or $70 billion. But none of this will go beyond that which is already not being repaid. The Jubilee 2000 campaign: �The G8 are still offering debt relief >which is cost-free (because the debt would never be paid anyway). Such cost-free cancellation is also benefit-free. The G8 offer will make no inroads into the debt payments which currently displace spending on human development. Debt �sustainability� will continue to be defined as the level of debt service that the poorest countries can be forced to pay.... �For more than 20 years now, debt reduction has proceeded in small incremental steps, from �Toronto� terms to �London� terms, �Naples� terms, �Lyon� terms to the latest HIPC initiative. Just as these "pigeon-steps" made little progress in dealing with this problem, so it appears that �Cologne� terms will not provide an exit >from unpayable debts for the poorest countries. �The Cologne proposals for debt relief will send few new children to school, produce very few new hospitals and provide little hope of economic recovery for the most impoverished, highly indebted nations and their people. We will be no closer to the goal � agreed upon by the G8 governments � of halving the number of people living in absolute poverty by the year 2015...� The Jubilee 2000 campaign website is at http://www.j2000usa.org. C R E D I T S ------------------- Editor -- Vivian Hutchinson Associates - Rodger Smith, Dave Owens and Jo Howard Secretary - Shirley Vickery ISSN No. 1172-6695 S U B S C R I P T I O N S ---------------------------------- (annual, for 22 letters ... prices include GST) (a) posted, paper edition (4-6 pages) $79 this sub also includes a free email edition on request (b) emailed MS-Word edition $66 formatted for onscreen reading or printing, with hypertext links (c) emailed edition, raw text only $55 Bulk rates for all editions are available, contact us for details. An e-mail version of this letter is available to international friends and colleagues on an "exchange of information" basis and on the understanding that the Letter is not re-posted to New Zealand... this is because we need the paid subscriptions from our New Zealand colleagues in order to pay our way. Thanks. Subscription Enquiries -- Jobs Research Trust, P.O.Box 428, New Plymouth, New Zealand phone 06-753-4434 fax 06-759-4648 [EMAIL PROTECTED] J O B S R E S E A R C H W E B S I T E ---------------------------------- We also maintain an internet website with our back issues and key papers, and hotlinks to other internet resources. This can be visited at http://www.jobsletter.org.nz/ Our website resources are available freely to anyone with access to the internet. The most recent three months of Jobs Letter issues, however, will only be available to subscribers. M I S C E L L A N E O U S -------------------------- This is a subscriber-based publication -- ... which is how we pay our bills and keep going. If you are receiving this letter on a regular basis please subscribe. A Word on Spreading the Word -- We'd like you to let others know about the Jobs Letter and the work of the Jobs Research Trust. A personal note to friends and colleagues is the best. If you decide to post this entire Letter to a mailing list, newsgroup, message forum, computer conference etc., please reference it as a personal recommendation. And thanks for your help with networking! Thanks. ends ------ The Jobs Letter essential information on an essential issue [EMAIL PROTECTED] phone 06-753-4434 fax 06-759-4648 P.O.Box 428 New Plymouth, Taranaki, New Zealand visit The Jobs Research Website at http://www.jobsletter.org.nz/
