Michael Ahern (Cork East, Fianna Fail)

——regardless of its legal status and the way in which it is financed. Similarly, it has defined an economic activity as "any activity consisting in offering goods and services to a given market". The Commission in following this wide definition has taken the view that it includes any activity directed at trade in goods and services, irrespective of the legal form of the undertaking and regardless of whether or not it is intended to earn profits. It is the person's or body's engagement in commercial activity which makes it an undertaking for the purposes of competition law and the pursuit of profit is not essential. In practice, the definition of undertaking has been taken to include companies, self-employed persons, including performing artistes, agricultural co-operatives and sports associations.

I am aware, for example, of a particular 1978 European Commission case, the RAI-UNITEL case, in which the Commission found opera singers to be undertakings.

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