Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Yes, there are many moving parts. It is my assessment that a further moving part, that we would move to, would be if we were to make a kind of change that looked backwards. It is my view that such a move would have an effect on our ability to retain investment, jobs and all of those things in our country and, therefore, corporate tax policy, and the certainty of it, is so important.

In terms of the Deputy's concerns about the presence and diversity of different companies in the future, I will reiterate the following. Some of the companies that we have talked about have been based in Ireland for a very long period. We are talking about a corporate tax stream that has grown. I do not believe that it will continue to grow at this rate in the future though I cannot be certain. Mr. Coffey, in his report on corporation tax, made the point that he believes our revenue streams, as projected at present, will be stable up to 2020, which is quite an horizon to have available to me in terms of making an assessment like this one.