Peter Burke (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It has never looked through the eyes of the company. In other words, if someone sets up a company structure with only one client, the idea behind which is to minimise a person's tax liability, the Revenue considers that to be perfectly legal as long as the law is complied with regarding expenses and salaries.

What they are doing is perfectly legal. At times we think we should change the law if it is believed what is going on is not acceptable. If, like me, someone has a strong social conscience, he or she might be concerned that this is State money going into RTÉ or these agencies, but the point I am making is that what they are doing is fully legal. What many of the multinational companies do is also legal. We have heard this morning about overpayments and that we have to get value for money, but the head of Revenue is telling us that a presenter in RTÉ whose only client is RTÉ can set up a company to be paid on his or her own behalf in order to plan his or her income and that it is perfectly legal to do so. We have to be clear - that is the reality under the tax code. Perhaps there are other ways in which we might progress and we should change many of these things. That is a point worth making. Our job is to highlight where the State is not receiving value for money and go through Votes forensically, at which we have been doing a great job. Sometimes, however, there are laws which have to be changed and there are great arguments for so doing.