Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)

Trade is two-way. In response to the Deputy's original question, I said clearly that we are in a space where we need to have absolute confidence that any food that comes into the EU meets our standards. Our sanitary and phytosanitary, SPS, food safety standards are non-negotiable. They are the standards to which we expect our farmers to produce food in the EU and we do not accept secondary standards for anything that comes in from outside the EU. Should we produce everything here? That is a different argument in a way. We could get very protectionist. There was a time when Ireland tried to be self-sufficient in its food production system. We were a poor country back then. The highly integrated nature of trade around the world is here to stay.

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