John McGuinness (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the Minister, Deputy Fitzgerald, and the Minister of State, Deputy Halligan, and wish them well in their portfolios. There is a considerable amount of work to be done and enterprise is a huge part of the success story in Ireland. We need to enhance that story, enhance the staff around it and ensure that we break into new and different markets in order to create the sustainable jobs that we now need.

I will take up from the previous speaker in respect of the court system that is mentioned in CETA. I highlight people's concerns about that system. The key to dealing with it will be to ensure that the standards we ask for and demand for the quality of goods and services that we export abroad is maintained. The one thing that sets Ireland apart from most other countries is the fact that we deal in quality. When people see that a product was made or sourced in Ireland, they need to be comfortable with the fact that what we have here is a quality product. If we fly the flag of proper, high standards and good quality, the issues around that court system will be outweighed by the fact that we are adhering to high standards and do not adhere to a lower standard of any kind. We can say that about the export of our beef and many products. They are held well in markets that companies in Ireland have fought hard to get into.

In respect of any of the trade missions abroad, there is no doubt that their success has been down to the success of our diplomats, the bureaucrats who work for us in those countries, and above all the fact that Irish companies are able and willing to get into these markets. They have the products and services that are in demand in most of those areas.

We should not forget agriculture in terms of how we sell our products abroad, nor should we forget our horse industry.

There is a significant link between the way our horse industry exports abroad and making connections at the highest level within the biggest economies in order to open a door, establish friendship and make it easier for other entrepreneurs who travel in trade missions to gain access to some of the bigger companies. We do not make enough of that in the context of how we present ourselves abroad.

I wish to highlight the Asian markets, and, in particular, to mention Taiwan. We had an office in Taipei, which has been closed. It was costing in the region of €50,000 a year just to have a presence there, but that office should be re-opened. It is a country of 24 million people with major similarities between what its people want and demand, and what our country can provide. They are currently seeking a double taxation arrangement to which we should adhere and agree. Europe should be to the fore in forging new relationships, while acknowledging that country's status and diplomatic position and basing it solely on trade.

The "one China" policy is something that we recognise and there is no difference between us in that regard. Trade is now front and centre of everything that we should be doing. Why leave a country of 24 million people without touching it when other countries within the European Union are making direct trade arrangements with Taiwan? It does not make sense. It is a stepping stone directly into the Asian market, to China and beyond, and there is significant interest in that market. Right across most of the countries with which we now trade, apart from the equestrian business and the established commercial business, I have come across GAA clubs that are central to local communities and which are almost the representatives of this country in a foreign land. There is a need for us to do more with the diaspora, to include its members in everything and to build a new approach to doing trade and using links that would establish trade abroad.

We are a small country within Europe and the European Union should be taking far greater steps in regard to the more difficult countries with which we want to deal. The European Union can front-up the relationship and within that relationship we can deal with countries such as Taiwan. I make that case because I have seen the benefits of it directly, as have many Members of this House. I encourage the Minister to examine the potential in regard to the European approach to that trade.

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