Mr. Fergus Sharpe:

On the costings relating to the capital plans, those are largely outlined. Our focus on infrastructure is not so much on outlining new spending plans as suggesting fiscal measures that could be put in place to ensure that spending plans in the capital envelope will be delivered consistently as planned in the coming years. The lead feature in our submission has been in the enterprise space. For any proposal we have in that regard, to the extent that we have been able to cost it, a cost is included.

Our headline ask relates to cutting capital gains tax, CGT, for unlisted trading firms to 20%. That would start to compete with the UK, which has introduced a similar scheme called investor relief, specifically with a view to encouraging equity investment in its small and medium enterprise, SME, base. Thanks to a parliamentary question Deputy Quinlivan's colleague, Deputy Pearse Doherty, submitted for us last year, we were able to get an idea of the thinking of the Department of Finance on this and how much work it had done on it with a view to seeing where Ireland was in comparison with the UK on investor relief. We were informed that the Department is unable to calculate the cost of introducing the same scheme as the UK because tax returns do not identify the amount of the chargeable gains that are associated specifically with unlisted firms. Cuts in CGT and the cost for, say, every 5% or less are outlined in the Tax Strategy Group papers but those are static costings. It is worth bearing in mind that the whole point of this proposal is to have an effect on changing the pattern of investment towards unquoted firms rather than listed firms. One would need a dynamic costing rather than a static one.

We appreciate that it would probably have significant Exchequer implications in the short term, which is the reason, as Ms Burke outlined, we have suggested this as a goal to move to in the medium term while outlining a couple of more targeted measures that could be adopted in budget 2020 and in the coming years. We have led with entrepreneur relief. Our request to raise the lifetime cap on qualifying gains to €15 million, in the case of entrepreneur relief, would cost €84 million. Again, that is a static costing from the Department of Finance. The proposal relating to the research and development tax credit would cost €30 million. In terms of a reduction in the rate of income tax relating to dividends for entrepreneurs to 30%, we would be looking at a figure less than €95 million. I say less because we estimate that €95 million is what it would cost to reduce the rate of income tax on income from shared dividends in Irish resident companies universally to 30%. Limiting that to shares received by entrepreneurs or dividends from shares sold by entrepreneurs would limit it to a fraction of that figure. Further details are contained in our submission.