John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

In the brief time I have remaining, I will fire some questions at Dr. McQuinn. My first question might feed in to those asked by other members, so I do not expect him to answer in full now. One of the consequences we expected from Brexit was that the UK could become very competitive in respect of corporation tax, but the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak, has indicated the opposite. We talked about the large casualties, which I hope are temporary, arising from the economic impact, but clearly some companies and corporations have thrived during this period and will continue to do so, with profits growing exponentially. Is there a moral imperative on those companies whereby the State could say, given that they have thrived during the period while everybody else suffered, there is a financial and economic role for them to play in this?

If there are to be scarring effects, what new commerce, businesses or industries does Dr. McQuinn foresee emerging from this period? Does the ESRI have any information on that?