Barry Andrews (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

I have two proposals, the first of which concerns the economic partnership agreements. It has been widely acknowledged that there are serious dangers involved in arriving at these types of agreements. Through the european affairs committee we were about to raise this matter with the Minister of State, Deputy Conor Lenihan. He raised it with the General Affairs and External Relations Council of the European Union to his credit. He explained that Members of this House were concerned about the manner in which those trade agreements are being decided. It seems that the European Union is saying that its hands are tied by World Trade Organisation rules and this is the case. The World Trade Organisation requires that free trade agreements must have reciprocity. In other words, these countries must open their markets in the same way as we open our markets, and the Lomé agreements are in breach of the requirement of reciprocity. The waiver that the African, Caribbean and Pacific countries are currently enjoying will lapse at the end of 2007. My proposal is simply that the Irish Government should argue that free trade rules that apply to EPAs should be linked to the attainment of certain development indicators, in other words, that the stricter interpretation of reciprocity would not kick in until certain standards in regard to education, health and social welfare are achieved. This would require a change to rules in regard to the WHO or at the very least a ruling on an interpretation of existing rules. That would be a positive measure for the Irish Government to take in the context that everybody shares the same view.

The second proposal arises from a debate on alternative methods of funding the millennium development goals apart from traditional aid. One of the proposals the Minister, Deputy Cowen, rejected recently, and rightly so, was in regard to an air tax because it would distort domestic economies.

It is not my proposal, but the idea I would support is to tax the exports of armaments. One amazing statistic I saw recently was that since the Second World War 2% of wars have taken place in the developed world but 98% of armaments have come from there. That really says it all. Some 20% of armaments are required for the defence of countries. Everything else carries a moral question mark with it and a global tax on armament exports is something the Government should fight for, as an alternative and as an additional form of funding for the millennium development goals.

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