Cabinet Committees
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-29
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Micheál Martin (FF), Cork South-Central

Deputy Malcolm Byrne asked about co-operation between the EU and Canada. What we are looking at here is a closer relationship between the two, with a significant pivot by Canada to Europe because of its trade issues with the US. It is a good idea to have second level participation in Erasmus+. I met with Prime Minister Carney after the state of the union address by President von der Leyen. He certainly is very keen to strengthen the relationship between Europe and Canada. I hope he will be here in November for the European Political Community meeting, at which we will continue to pursue these issues.
I hope CETA will be ratified by the end of the year. There are legal issues in terms of challenges. It is proving to be extraordinarily beneficial to the Irish economy and Irish SMEs, with a fivefold increase in exports. It baffles me why Opposition Members are consistently against that trade deal. It seems they, and Sinn Féin in particular, have relegated trade to the bottom of the barrel in terms of the issues they feel we should be concerned about. It just baffles me that Sinn Féin is taking legal action against a trade agreement that benefits jobs, workers and many companies in this country.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-09-29/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:00:59+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-29