Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chairman, the Minister and his officials. I want to raise some specific points. During the summer I met a number of car dealership owners in Kildare, who are constituents of mine. They highlighted their concerns about changes due to be made in 2020 to the CO2 testing regime and the potential impact of the changes in bands on the price differentials between old and new cars, with specific reference to car imports. Their view is that changes to the VRT regime are needed to take account of the distortions that will be caused by the new CO2 testing regime. There is a lot of concern about this issue in car dealerships. I want to check that this is something with which the Minister and his officials are familiar and of which they are aware. I would like to hear any view the Minister might have on it.

The Minister referenced Brexit. We are all concerned about the level of Brexit preparedness. Looking at the key economic indicators in assessing how well prepared businesses are, I am conscious that the economic operators' registration and identification, EORI, number is something an Irish business will need to have to import into and export out of the European Union. Irish businesses will need to have an EORI number to be able to trade with the United Kingdom post Brexit, while UK businesses will need to have a number to trade. Does the Minister have statistics or numbers to indicate where we are with applications for EORI numbers? Has there been an increase recently?

Last week Mr. Seamus Coffey of the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council, IFAC, came before the committee. I raised my concerns about IFAC's role in the costing of Opposition party budget proposals. In particular, I referred to Fianna Fáil's growing list of spending promises made it seems to every group. The total cost was €14.35 billion in the first six months of 2019. In his response Mr Coffey highlighted IFAC's narrow mandate to assess the fiscal and macro plans set out by the Government. He highlighted that the bodies in other EU countries with a similar mandate to that of IFAC also worked on costings and the plans of Opposition parties. Yesterday I wrote to the Minister to ask whether the Department was open to enabling a broader costings function in IFAC's policy framework.