John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the representatives. I will give Ms Sinnamon a break and turn to Mr. Shanahan.

I want to ask Mr. Shanahan about our competitiveness and issues that derive from this building, what the Legislature is doing, how it affects our competitiveness and how he does his job, and our attractiveness or lack thereof when it comes to potential investors in the country.

It is a while ago now, but it was announced in the budget that the double Irish taxation scheme was to be ended, ultimately, at the end of 2020 and, for new entrants, this year. As Mr. Shanahan will be aware, it would require all companies registered here to be tax resident also. I will not go into the rights and wrongs of ending the double Irish. I presume that there were opinions given within IDA Ireland. I have a strong opinion on the ending of the double Irish. I do not agree with it, and I never have. It worries me when law makers in the United States are now talking about further legislation that needs to be enacted, such as the anti-inversion in Congress which would allow addresses to be changed if there was a takeover to allow a company to avail of a low-tax regime. Everybody thinks this is great, we are civically minded globally and it is a wonderful step forward, etc. I am not so sure this economy is in a place to be so generous with regard to giving up what Mr. John Sculley, former CEO of Apple, referred to as our "edge" when it comes to attracting businesses. I agree with him.

What I am asking Mr. Shanahan is how, from this point on, he will gauge what effect the ending of the double Irish will have on companies that potentially would be investors in this country. How will he find out how disastrous or otherwise this could be? What kind of a system of communication does he have in place with these companies and potential investors to ascertain the effect that something like this could have on the economy because, potentially, it could be quite damaging? I will ask Mr. Shanahan that first and maybe get into other competitiveness issues that arise.