Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

To go back to the earlier question on why there is investment protection, the truth is that some countries which enter into trade agreements could introduce discriminatory rules aimed at just a particular company because it was a non-national company. In some cases, we have had outright expropriation of companies that invested in a country. The idea of these investment protection treaties is to give some certainty to a company which decides to invest in a particular regime, where perhaps the domestic law is weak or not well enforced. The treaties are absolutely not designed to undermine the capacity of countries to provide public policy protections in different areas, and that is very explicit.

A worry arose after the Australian Government brought in plain packaging for cigarettes. Some tobacco companies have chosen to use some of these agreements as a way of trying to undermine that. Those cases have not yet been heard, and they are choosing to use the WTO and other vehicles of international agreements to try to overturn the Australian Government's decision. However, we have been very clear. We are not going to enter into an investment treaty agreement that could be exposed to that kind of risk, and the EU is taking action to try to improve the way that arbitration works to give better assurance to the public on that front.

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