Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Mr. Brady mentioned research and development and my colleagues had questions on this. We have had discussions in this committee and indeed on the Finance Bill regarding research and development tax credit. It is coming to a point where we need to figure out this out. This tax credit is likely to cost a €1 billion at some stage. It was up to €708 million in 2015, and is likely to have increased in 2016 and 2017 again. A smaller number of companies are availing of it and we imagine that these companies are the larger multinational companies and not indigenous SMEs. How does one design something that is focused on making sure research and development is taking place, and that it is incentivised at local level?