Professor Graham Butler:

In the context of the EU's external trade, when it comes to third countries looking at the European Union in trade, they see the EU as a single unit. The EU has a trade competence and that is what it exercises. However, if there are slow elements of fragmentation, the narrative of the EU as a single actor becomes a little undone and it feeds into the free circulation problem I pointed out with regard to the Bill. The Bill only concerns itself with direct imports. It does not consider the free circulation issue. If goods are lawfully imported to another EU member state and marketed there, they will enter free circulation and can therefore ultimately end up in the jurisdiction and be sold anyway. Therefore, it could be said that if someone wanted goods from the occupied Palestinian territories to enter Ireland, given that Ireland is going it alone, there would still be a way for them to lawfully end up in the jurisdiction. They would just have to go via another EU member state first. It could be argued that is more symbolism than trying to completely block the imports.

I read the report of the proceedings of the committee's public sitting with the political director of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade last week. The volume of trade with Ireland that we are talking about is incredibly low, at least from what we know based on established trade patterns.