Mr. Colin Brown:

I thank members for their questions and comments. I will answer them to the best of my ability.

In response to the comment that the TTIP is an affront to democracy, once such agreements are negotiated, they will have to be approved by the European Parliament and, we expect, national parliaments. There will be a democratic say at the end of negotiations on whether the agreements are acceptable. We take a great deal of care when designing and negotiating these treaties to make sure they are consistent with constitutional requirements and at the same time consistent with the basic right to regulate. The four substantive standards I mentioned in my presentation are written in such a way - the European Union intends in the TTIP context to further clarify this - that they will not undermine the right to regulate. Genuine legislation adopted to pursue a health or labour goal or to implement the concept of collective bargaining applied on a non-discriminatory basis cannot be undermined via an ISDS because we design the rules in such a way to make sure they will not be undermined. The cases mentioned by Deputy Sandra McLellan against Australia on plain packaging and Canada on fracking are pending and we will need to see how they play out. The European Union’s objective in drafting is to make sure we will be in a situation where the type of regulatory action taken, for example, on plain packaging, on which Ireland has also adopted legislation, draft language, in particular on the concept of expropriation, the key aspect here, will not be successful under the TTIP or our agreement with Canada and other such agreements. The right to regulate, ensuring there is no impact on democratically decided legislation, has been very carefully constructed by the Commission.

The Vice Chairman asked about the possibility of a member state being sued because of implementation of an EU directive. Legislation has been passed through the European Council and the Parliament in recent years which has put a framework in place for this. It has several levels of complication, but the basic manner in which it works is that if a member state was transposing an EU directive, the European Union would be the defendant and carry financial responsibility in the case, if any financial responsibility were to flow in that circumstance.

Deputy Bernard J. Durkan asked about the establishment of a multilateral court. The Commission views this as desirable and we want to work on the issue, but it will take some time to achieve. There are other countries which are interested in pursuing this issue and we need to build negotiations with them. In the meantime we want to make sure the improvements I mentioned in my presentation are already applicable. They will be via the TTIP and will be added to the other negotiations on this type of issue.

We would hope that within a certain period they would be replaced by a multilateral system.

Perhaps I can respond to Deputy McLellan on the issue of transparency. The Commission is very conscious of the importance of these negotiations and the concerns that arise. We make ourselves available to all interested parties. For example, oninvestor states, I have had more meetings with NGOs and other entities than with corporate lobbyists. We are subject to transparency requirements and citizens can request that we make public the records of all our meetings. I understand that many people are concerned about this but I can assure the Deputy the Commission is very careful in terms of ensuring that what it is negotiating is something that is ultimately for the public good. I will stop here but I am happy to take other questions.