Daniel McConnell

So the EU, and I think Olaf Gill, the Irish spokesperson for the Commission, has basically said Europe is working very hard to try and eliminate these forced labour practices in the industry chains out.

But the higher rate was being applied to those who have failed to impose any sort of tariff

or enforce any move against these sort of forced labour practices.

Obviously the idea of forced labour has been a long controversial one because developed economies like our own and other Western countries have looked to cheaper labour forces in the Far East and elsewhere to produce their goods and services at a much lower cost.

And ultimately what I suppose the Trump administration is using the cover or the excuse if you want to in relation to forced labour

as a means to reintroducing this tariff regime.

But I think the reality is, the pragmatic reality is that the Trump administration would have used any excuse if it could find it to reinforce the tariff wall that essentially was struck down by the Supreme Court.

Absolutely.

And again, it also allows Trump to almost browbeat and kind of humiliate other economies, you know, the virtuous EU, as he often calls them, for essentially standing over poor practices.

So it's this curious position that the most rogue president in modern history, or if ever,

you know, now stands on a platform of almost berating or kind of giving out or having the high ground and moralising over other developed countries.

But again, I think the hope had been once the Supreme Court had struck down these tariffs that a bit of calm may have introduced, particularly heading into midterms.

And there's a fear, I suppose, from the Republican side that they will suffer heavy defeats.

But it's clear from the utterances from the White House in the last 24 hours or so, they're not for turning.

They're

determined to see this tariff wall rebuilt.

And it's really, they don't care who is in the firing line or not.

And ultimately, from an Irish perspective, as I said, the big concentration, the big fear since all this started about 18 months ago has been the focus on our farmer sector.

Thankfully, so far, our farmer has escaped.

the worst of it, but there's still that genuine fear.