Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 15:

In page 65, between lines 10 and 11, to insert the following:

“Reports

24. The Minister shall, within six months of the passing of this Act, prepare and lay before Dáil Éireann a report on the revenue gained from increasing corporation tax to 25 per cent for corporations with over €800,000 in profits and in closing loopholes that exist that allow corporations to hugely reduce their rate of tax.”.

I start with a specific point regarding loopholes that exist to allow corporations to significantly reduce their rate of tax. I will ask the Minister a question that I have put to the Tánaiste and the Taoiseach but to which I have not received a fully reply. The Irish Times reported in July that it had been informed by Department of Finance officials that the European Court of Justice, ECJ, hearings on the Apple tax case were likely to be held in autumn and the court would give the State four to six weeks' notice that those hearings were about to begin in advance of a final decision on the case - the biggest tax case in corporate history - next year. I asked the Tánaiste and the Taoiseach the following questions. Do the State and the Department of Finance have any information as to the timing of those hearings? Will they take place before Christmas or in the new year? If it is the latter, when in the new year will they take place? Alternatively, does the State have no information whatsoever on this matter? I cannot imagine that there has not been contact between the Department of Finance and the relevant ECJ sources in that regard. If the Minister were to provide the House with that information, I would appreciate it.

On the substantive issue of the amendment, what is the Minister's estimate for total corporation profits for 2022? I have tried to estimate total corporate profits for previous years. For example, we are told that the de facto rate of corporation tax paid in 2020 was closer to 8% than to 12.5%. Depending on whose estimate one goes by, it seems likely that corporation tax receipts this year will be approximately €20 billion. Perhaps the Minister can give the most up-to-date estimate in that regard. If it is €20 billion at a de factorate of 8%, that would point towards total corporate profits of €250 billion. I do not know whether the rate this year will be 8%, 9%, 10% or some other percentage. I ask the Minister to give the House his best estimate as to what the total corporate profits are likely to be this year.

Irrespective of the figure the Minister provides, I know for a fact that it will relate to a vast quantity of untaxed wealth. At a time when workers on the lowest rate of income tax are paying at a rate of 20%, what will be paid by the corporations that are making fabulous profits will be not just less than that, it will be considerably less. The argument used by the Minister and the senior officials in his Department against raising corporation tax to the 20% rate for which others have advocated, or to anything above 15% is that if that is done, is that there will be a flight of capital. In other words, multinational investment will leave the country and the State may end up with a smaller tax take than if the rate was lower. However, I have yet to see convincing information and data to support that argument. Apart from anything else, that is why I would like to get the report to which the amendment refers.

Many serious commentators on the economy point to foreign direct investment in the State being based on other factors, such as access to the European Union and European markets, the State having an English-speaking workforce and population, the high level of education and so on. I would like to see a report placed before the House in order that these issues can be debated, rather than hearing arguments that are based on scaremongering and an attempt to panic people with the idea that if corporations were asked to pay a rate of tax that is not too much above the rate paid by workers on the lowest wages, who pay the lowest rate of income tax, they will leave the country. Let us have the report and be able to debate the issue on the basis of what it reveals. The key point is that there are vast amounts of untaxed profits and wealth at a time of incredible social need. I do not have to point to the 11,000 people in emergency accommodation or the 30, 40 or 50 other examples I could give. We need a realistic debate on these issues.

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