Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

While anybody looking in on this debate would find it very technical, detailed and difficult to follow, some key issues need to emerge from it. I was surprised and interested to learn when I was researching this matter that Ireland has been Ghana's largest source of foreign direct investment since 2012. Tax revenue accounts for 16% of GDP in Ghana, which is a very low figure. The European average would be between 25% and 30%. The proposed arrangement would limit Ghana's taxing rights over income, profits and economic activity. There is a connection between the fact that taxation accounts for only 16% of Ghana's GDP and the fact that 5% of the country's children do not make it to their fifth birthday. What is the level and standard of public services in Ghana, for example, the health service and health programmes?

Any taxation agreement must nail down best practice and box off opportunities for wealthy individuals and corporations to avoid tax. I am not convinced that this agreement meets those requirements and nor are development organisations such as Christian Aid. The latter has produced a document that includes seven key questions for the Government, of which I will cite only two. First, why does the new tax treaty contain none of the provisions against tax abuse agreed in 2015 by OECD member states, including Ireland in Action 6 of BEPS, which Ireland has committed to implementing? Second, in 2017 the Department of Finance promised that Ireland would invite tax treaty partners that have not signed the OECD multinational instrument to introduce anti-abuse measures unilaterally in their tax treaties with Ireland. Did the Government make such an offer to Ghana? If so, why did Ghana decline this offer and, if not, why did it not make such an offer? Those questions have emerged in this discussion already.

I have listened carefully to the answers given by the Minister of State. I am not sure that I understand every dot and comma of what he said because this is highly technical material. He can correct me if I am wrong but his argument appears to be that because Ireland raised this matter with Ghana and it did not insist on these measures, there was nothing we could do and in any case there will be processes in the future that will help to nail down these issues. That is not good enough.

This is a technical debate but the issues are real. I support Deputy Ó Broin's suggestion that the core aspects of the Bill be debated on the floor of the Dáil. I will support any such formal proposal.