Mr. Sebastian Barnes:

One thing we do know is what has happened so far. In the earlier phases of the base erosion and profit shifting, BEPS, process, many people expected the outcome to be very unfavourable to Ireland. In the end, because of the precise way that BEPS happened - and maybe because of other factors that arose at the same time - we had a big surge in corporation tax receipts. This shows that over a period of a couple of years, companies can move these tax revenues in very big amounts relative to the scale of the Irish economy. We know that. Whether they will be moved to do that again depends on what happens on the policy side and other factors.

These things can move. It is not a one-way street. That is why we need a prudent approach on the corporation tax side. We need to reduce the structural reliance on that spending in the years ahead. We need to do that as far as we can under our own control, which means saving it and being prudent rather than waiting for a measure to be imposed on us.