Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

The amendment was tabled by Deputy Barry but, unfortunately, he is tied up with Leaders' Questions in the House. While the amendment is in our names too, I should have said that People Before Profit holds a slightly different position, namely, that of raising the tax rate to 25%. I nonetheless think that the spirit and thrust of the amendment, in focusing on this issue, is correct because, as I suggested last night, the effective rate is much lower than 12.5%, which relates to gross trading profits. The total profits for the latest available figures are €182 billion, whereas the taxable profits are only €96 billion. I do not accept, therefore, the Minister's claim that it is straightforward. The fact that, in most cases, large corporations can write down their taxable profits using myriad reliefs, deductions and allowances available to them - loopholes, in layman's terms - means they are not really paying 12.5% on their profits. They are paying 5.7%, less than half of that. There is no need for that and I reject the claim that if they were made to pay the actual 12.5%, they would all go flying out of the country.

I refer the Minister to a recent interview on "Morning Ireland" with US Representative Brendan Boyle, a Democratic Congressman from Philadelphia, where he was asked about this issue. He was categorical and there was no equivocation. He said bluntly that Ireland's tax rate was not the key issue with the location of US multinational investment in this country but rather that it was our involvement in the EU market and the fact that Ireland is an English-speaking country. Critically, he emphasised the fact that we have a highly educated workforce. There is a suggestion that if these multinational corporations were made to pay 12.5% - which, if they did so on gross trading profits, would deliver double the sum we are getting now, or an additional €10 billion in revenue - they would leave. Brendan Boyle, however, in putting forward arguments from the point of view of an American politician, stated that they would not leave. There is simply too much profit being made here by those companies and, even if they had actually to pay 12.5%, they would still make very considerable profits and pay a very low proportion of those profits in corporation tax.

We should not, therefore, take this kid-glove attitude to the corporations. We need money for housing, water infrastructure, health infrastructure and so many different areas. Indeed, those companies depend significantly on that infrastructure, not least the education infrastructure. As Brendan Boyle pointed out, with that educated workforce from which they generate so much money, why on earth would we not at least make them pay 12.5% in order that the money could be redirected into further enhancing our education system and other key public services and infrastructure?