Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

To go back slightly, my second question is on digital taxation. In recent times Italy seems to have been having conversations with companies about locating in Italy and thereby creating a jobs base, particularly in parts of northern Italy. The consequence of that, in terms of some of the discussions on the digital tax, is that Italy is going to allow credit in respect of other taxes levied on such entities in that country. Is that a model which the French, for example, will follow? The French actually do well out of IT but they certainly have a fixation on Ireland in that respect. They have had that fixation over the tenure of the last two or three presidents. It is kind of a long-running thing for them. Do the witnesses have a sense of what the trade-offs are likely to be? As it is evolving, this tax is becoming, in a sense, a specialised form of VAT at a low rate with credit write-offs. Do the witnesses have any sense of where it is intended to take it in order to get wider agreement at the European Council?