Michael Ahern (Cork East, Fianna Fail)
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Ireland has not entered into any trade agreements with any new countries in the past five years. That is because international trade policy matters are a Community, and not solely a national, competence. As such, the European Union negotiates as a single entity on the basis of proposals made by the European Commission, which are developed and agreed by the EU Council of Ministers. However, the European Union has not in the past five years entered into bilateral trade agreements with third countries, given that it was a period in which the Community conducted extensive multilateral trade negotiations under the Doha development agenda with our WTO partners following the launch of the WTO trade round, in Doha, in November 2001.