Mr. John Callinan:

Aviation is one of the areas we have highlighted as being of critical importance. It is a good example, if not by any means the only one, of how complex this process will be. This is reinforced by the Senator's point that the nature of the aviation industry is such that a great deal of planning is done up to 12 months in advance in terms of capacity building, ticket selling and so on. It is one of the issues we have been impressing on the Commission task force. While it is not unique to Ireland, we have a particular interest in having the issue addressed early. We have been impressing on Mr. Barnier's task force that it cannot be left to be picked up in a future trade agreement. Aviation is not currently on the list of immediate withdrawal issues and we are pushing hard to ensure it will be addressed as early as possible in the negotiations for precisely the reasons the Senator raised.