Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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177. To ask the Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation the status of plans by the European Commission to begin talks with trade partners inside the World Trade Organization on the way in which to deal with the European Union’s large food import quotas, that is, tariff rate quotas with other countries after Brexit; if submissions have been made to the Commission in this regard; and her views on the way in which such quotas should be dealt with in a hard or no deal Brexit scenario. [29917/18]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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On 26 June 2018, the European Council authorised the European Commission to open formal negotiations within the World Trade Organisation (WTO) on how to divide up existing EU Tariff Rate Quotas (TRQs) between the EU27 Member States and the United Kingdom (UK). The European Commission leads on these matters as under the Treaties competence on trade issues is vested in the Commission under the Common Commercial Policy.

The UK’s withdrawal from the EU has implications beyond the bilateral relationship between the EU and the UK, in particular with regard to their commitments under the Agreement establishing the WTO. When the European Community accepted the WTO Agreement and the Multilateral Trade Agreements in 1994, the schedule of concessions and commitments that was Annexed to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) 1994 for the European Communities was thereby simultaneously annexed for the UK. As a consequence of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, the EU’s existing quantitative commitments, notably the TRQs, will require adjustment.

Given the timeframe under which the aforementioned negotiations will need to be conducted, it cannot be excluded that some may not be concluded within the necessary time limits before the UK is no longer covered under the EU’s WTO Schedule. To this end, the European Commission published a proposal for a Regulation - COM (2018) 312 – on 22 May 2018 which seeks to ensure that in the absence of such agreement, the EU can nevertheless proceed with the apportionment of the TRQs by modifying the WTO tariff concessions and that the Commission is given the necessary powers to consequently amend the relevant EU provisions on the opening and implementation of the relevant TRQs.

The products which have TRQs attached are primarily agricultural and fishery products (including specific beef, swine, sheep, poultry, dairy, fruit, vegetables, wheat, maize, rice and fish products), and a small number of industrial products (including specific wood, silicon, glass, flax and fructose products). The methodology applied to apportionment is based on the UK's share of total Union imports under the TRQ over a recent representative three-year period (2013-2015). This usage share is applied to the entire scheduled TRQ volume to arrive at the UK’s share of a given TRQ. The Union’s share then consists of the remainder of the TRQ in question. This means the total volume of a given TRQ is not changed. The full product list including the EU share in quota is contained in the Regulation Annex.

Ireland appreciates the European Commission’s need to act swiftly in this area, against the backdrop of the UK’s planned withdrawal from the Union, and the urgency which was therefore attached to securing the necessary negotiating mandate from Council.

My Department has actively engaged with the discussions to date at EU level. Ireland prioritises the need to minimise disruption to trade as the UK leaves the EU and the importance of maintaining the existing levels of market access, which is the intention of the European Commission. Ireland was one of a number of Member States who sought to enhance the consultation requirements for the European Commission with Member States in the apportionment process and we were successful in that regard. This provides us with assurances that any unintended consequences of the proposed approach, given the fluidity of the overall Brexit process, will be discussed by Member States at the relevant Committee, in particular, the Trade Policy Committee.

As appropriate, my Department will be liaising closely with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine and Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade as the negotiations commence and progress.

Finally, one of the Government’s central objectives for the Brexit negotiations is to minimise the impact on trade and the economy. Research commissioned by my Department demonstrates that a hard Brexit scenario would be most harmful for the Irish economy. This is a scenario we are working to avoid. In this context, it is one of our key negotiating principles to maintain as close a trading relationship with the United Kingdom as possible, post Brexit. In this regard, it is welcome that both the British Government, in Prime Minister Theresa May’s Mansion House Speech on 2 March 2018, and the EU, in its 23 March 2018 Guidelines on the framework for the future relationship, have signalled a desire to maintain zero tariffs and no quantitative restrictions insofar as bilateral EU/UK trade in goods is concerned.