Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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We had a discussion on the financial transaction tax at the first meeting I chaired in January in Brussels. There is a legal power within the treaties whereby if a group of countries wants to advance a particular policy, it can move ahead under what is called enhanced co-operation. Some 11 countries signed up to follow that route. That is only the start of the matter, not the end of it, because they must now come together, engage with the Commission and bring forward a policy document which reflects the consensus view.

The discussion on the financial transaction tax is not just among the 11 who have signed up for it. Everybody participates in the discussion, even those of us who did not sign up to it. In the treaties, it is made very clear that any measure taken by way of enhanced co-operation cannot interfere with the Single Market. I note the UK Government has already signalled that in respect of the financial transaction tax it may take legal action, because it thinks it may interfere with the Single Market. Therefore, there is many a hurdle to be cleared before there is a financial transaction tax.

As far as we know from proposals made in France, Germany and Austria, which were made separately from the united front they are now showing, they are talking about something akin to a stamp duty on transactions. We have that already. We have a 1% stamp duty on transactions on shares. The UK, although the biggest objector to a financial transaction tax, has a 0.5% duty. If the tax is something along those lines, it will not really matter. However, I presume the tax will be extended beyond the buying and selling of shares into other financial instruments. Our position is that if a financial transaction tax was introduced by the G8 at its meeting in Enniskillen and it applied everywhere in the world, we would have no problem with that. However, our difficulty is that if we had a financial transaction tax and the UK did not, activity would move from Dublin to London. With regard to whether it would be an advantage to us if the other European countries went ahead with it, any advantage would be marginal. If something was done in the United Kingdom, that would be an advantage, but while we are in the same space as London a financial transaction tax would make very little difference.

On the other tax issues, on Tuesday we will discuss – and I think we have agreement on it – a mandate to provide information on non-national deposits in banking systems. We want to negotiate with five non-European countries on the provision of information - Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Andorra, Monaco and one other. We will make progress on that. Those who were holding out on that were Luxembourg and Austria, but during the week I had conversations with the finance Ministers of both countries and we have moved them along, so they will now move on that.

With regard to corporation tax, a Commission paper remains extant with regard to a common base for corporation tax, but there is a wide disparity of views across the Union on that policy paper. I do not see significant progress towards a decision. There will probably be discussions on the issue, but none have been planned for the Irish Presidency. The issue may arise towards the end of the year.