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UTRCA receives funding for Celebrating Natural Connections events (media release: August 16, 2022)

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UTRCA Receives Funding for Celebrating Natural Connections events (media release: August 16, 2022)

With the support of municipalities and community organizations, the Upper Thames River Conservation Authority (UTRCA) has obtained more than $230,000 in funding support from the Canadian Heritage Celebration and Commemoration Program Reopening Fund. The funds are being used to host a series of free “Celebrating Natural Connections” public events in natural spaces across the Upper Thames River watershed.

“Celebrating Natural Connections will feature 10 public hikes and two virtual hikes, led by community groups and UTRCA environmental education staff,” said Teresa Hollingsworth, UTRCA Community and Corporate Services Manager. “

There will also be activities, displays, and presentations, and a commemorative item will be installed at many locations to recognize the contributions of local front line workers. Local artists and municipalities will be involved, as well as hiking, naturalist, and angler clubs.”

The UTRCA would especially like to invite all those community members that have been instrumental in helping others through the pandemic.

The first event is taking place at Burgess Park in the City of Woodstock on Saturday, August 27, from 10 am to 2 pm. For more information about the upcoming events, please visit: www.thamesriverevents.ca

“We’re thrilled to receive the fund enabling us to host these events in our watershed,” said Hollingsworth. “Throughout the pandemic, we were reminded of the importance of our natural spaces for people’s well-being and we’re honoured to provide programming for the public at these sites. These Celebrating Natural Connections events also let us join our community partners and municipalities in recognizing the efforts of front line workers in the response to COVID-19.”

This project is funded in part by the Government of Canada.

Contact: Teresa Hollingsworth, Community and Corporate Services Manager

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Wimbledon receives most funding under Covid events insurance scheme

The Wimbledon tennis tournament has received by far the largest amount of government support from a Covid-19 insurance scheme set up to help live events organisers.

Organisers of live events ranging from music festivals to business conferences and car shows found it impossible last year to find commercial insurance, as insurers balked at the high risk of coronavirus restrictions being reimposed. After months of pleas for help from the events sector, the government intervened in August 2021 to provide reinsurance, in a move the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, said would allow events organisers to “plan with confidence”.

However, there are concerns the scheme has fallen short of the £800m in cover that was originally promised. The government has so far only disclosed support worth £109m for 18 entities, one of which was the Ministry of Defence in its running of the RAF Cosford air show, according to state aid disclosures.

By far the biggest disclosed beneficiary was the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club Ltd (AELTC), the company that runs the Wimbledon championships and whose board members include the former British tennis stars Tim Henman and Anne Keothavong. It received £77m, more than 70% of the total disclosed. Wimbledon’s organisers had previously won plaudits for taking out commercial pandemic insurance that paid out well over £100m when the tournament was cancelled in 2020.

The second largest beneficiary of the government scheme was the British Phonographic Industry, the music industry lobby group that organises the Brit Awards. It received £9.2m.

The government said it was only obliged to publish details of awards worth more than £500,000, and that more than half the events covered were in the arts or entertainment.

The scheme’s overall low take-up contrasts with the £800m cited in the original announcement. The government has been criticised for offering help that came months too late for many events. Events organisers also complained that the cover on offer had important gaps, including not insuring cancellations if an artist or crew member contracted Covid-19 and tours had to be cancelled.

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Paul Reed, the chief executive of the Association of Independent Festivals, a lobby group, said the insurance was too expensive, and that it lacked coverage where social distancing was enforced, which meant it “wasn’t useful for festivals or live music”.

“I’m yet to speak to a single festival who took out the insurance,” he said. “It simply wasn’t fit for purpose.”

A government source said the scheme was “demand-led”, meaning it was unable to increase the number of businesses covered.

Other beneficiaries of the scheme have included businesses running food and gardening events and even antiques shows, as well as trade shows on topics such as engineering technology and medicine.

Sally Bolton, the AELTC chief executive, said: “The AELTC welcomes the support of the live events reinsurance scheme in relation to The Championships 2022.”

A spokesperson for the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said: “Our live events reinsurance scheme backed our brilliant arts, sporting and music events to continue despite the uncertainty caused by the pandemic and followed the unprecedented support provided for the culture sector through our £2bn culture recovery fund.

“It has helped support almost 15,000 jobs, more than £400m of investment and 3 million people are expected to attend events supported by the scheme this summer. The generous scheme remains open for bids until September.”

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Commerce Department Receives Comments on Indo-Pacific Economic Framework | Perspectives & Events | Mayer Brown

FSB Releases Report on Approaches to Climate-Related Risks | Perspectives & Events | Mayer Brown

On April 11, the US Department of Commerce (the “Department”) and the Office of the US Trade Representative (“USTR”) closed their public comment period for the administration’s proposed Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (“IPEF”). The comments provided during the period will help the Department and USTR set goals for the final agreement.

Background on Comment Period

The IPEF is designed as a joint effort between the Department of Commerce and USTR, with each agency overseeing separate “pillars” of the agreement. USTR will handle the pillar on “fair and resilient trade,” and the Department will handle the pillars on supply chain resilience; infrastructure, clean energy, and decarbonization; and tax and anti-corruption.1 For more information on IPEF, please refer to our previous newsletter entry.

Both agencies sought public input on the following 10 items:

  1. General negotiating objectives for the IPEF.
  2. Digital and emerging technologies-related issues.
  3. Supply chain resilience-related issues.
  4. Infrastructure-related issues.
  5. Clean energy-related issues.
  6. Decarbonization-related issues.
  7. Tax-related issues.
  8. Anti-corruption-related issues.
  9. Issues of particular relevance to small and medium-sized businesses that should be addressed in the negotiations.
  10. Other issues for consideration.2

Summary of Comments

The Department of Commerce received 60 comments during the public comment period, and several trends emerged across the submissions. USTR received 1,300 comments, although many of those comments were form letters discussing workers’ rights provisions. This summary focuses on broad trends in comments submitted by industry associations, human rights groups, and corporations; the full dockets are available online at regulations.gov for the Department of Commerce and USTR.

To start, there was widespread agreement among the commenters on the need for trade negotiations in the Indo-Pacific region. Several commenters noted the lack of US participation in trade agreements like the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (“CPTPP”) and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (“RCEP”),3 but labor rights groups focused on the shortcomings of previous negotiations in the region, like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and hoped that workers’ rights would be protected in these negotiations.4 Commenters in general hoped for widespread participation in the IPEF among countries in the region, who will sign on to all pillars of the agreement, rather than an a la carte participation option.5

Industry associations and corporations urged negotiators to reduce non-tariff barriers to trade and set uniform regulatory standards across participating IPEF nations, which would increase certainty in the business environment.6 Ensuring multilateral participation in export control regimes was a popular example of regulatory streamlining that commenters argued negotiators should pursue.7 Several commenters suggested repurposing standards for trade facilitation and digital trade in already existing agreements, like the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (“USMCA”) and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum (“APEC”).8 However, certain human rights groups noted that agreements like the USMCA fell short on data privacy concerns, and further standardizing that model in another trade agreement would be damaging.9

Technology groups were particularly active in suggesting infrastructure provisions, noting that the Asia-Pacific region presents unique challenges like reliance on offshore cable lines and cloud computing that an agreement would need to address.10 In addition, technology groups also asked that the agreements consider technology training programs among IPEF participants to develop a skilled workforce able to engage in digital trade.11

Finally, looking at supply chains, certain commenters were concerned about a “too-heavy focus on only supplying from the US domestic market,” instead advocating for a more flexible approach to supply chain management.12 These groups hoped for a “friendshoring” approach, where US companies would still source from abroad, though primarily through allied countries, and added that an early warning network for supply chain disruptions would help industry predictability.13 Human and labor rights groups advocated for forced labor provisions to be included in the final agreement.14

Next Steps

The relevant agencies now will review the comments and develop a negotiating strategy for the agreement. President Biden formally launched IPEF on May 23, 2022, during his travel to Tokyo.

 


 

 

1 85 Fed. Reg. 13971 (March 11, 2022).

2 Id.

3 E.g. Consumer Technology Association, Request for Comments on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, ITA-2022-0001-0056, at 8 (hereinafter CTA Comment); US Chamber of Commerce, Office of the US Trade Representative: Comments on the Proposed Fair and Resilient Trade Pillar of an Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (FRN Docket No. USTR-2022-0002), ITA-2022-0001-0024, at 2 (hereinafter US Chamber Comment).

4 E.g. Alliance for American Manufacturing, Re: Request for Comments on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (ITA-2022-0001), ITA-2022-0001-0048, at 2-3 (hereinafter AAM Comment).

5 E.g. CTA Comment at 4.

E.g. American Association of the Indo-Pacific, Comments to the US Federal Register: Docket No. ITA-2022-0001 Concerning the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, ITA-2022-0002-0058 (hereinafter AAIP Comment).

7 US Chamber Comment at 18; National Foreign Trade Council, Comments Regarding the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, ITA-2022-0002-0057, at 19 (hereinafter NFTC Comment).

8 E.g. US Chamber Comment at 4; NFTC Comment.

9 E.g. Public Citizen, Comments from Public Citizen Regarding the Proposed Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, ITA-2022-0001-0033, at 5 (hereinafter Public Citizen Comment).

10 E.g. Microsoft, Microsoft Corporation’s Response to Office of US Trade Representative Request for Comments on the Proposed Fair and Resilient Trade Pillar of an Indo-Pacific Economic Framework and US Department of Commerce Request for Comments on the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, ITA-2022-0001-0034, at 6 (hereinafter Microsoft Comment); Google, Comments Regarding the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, ITA-2022-0001-0046, at 8 (hereinafter Google Comment).

11 E.g. Microsoft Comment at 3-4; Google Comment at 3.

12 NFTC Comment at 15.

13 Id. at 16; CTA Comment at 7.

14 Public Citizen Comment at 3; AAM Comment at 5.