Ms Cora O'Brien:

There has been a lot of media interest in Ireland's corporate tax regime which is focused mainly on the interaction of different tax systems. The Irish tax regime per seis not the issue. As the Department of Finance's study of most other taxation methodologies implies, the base is very broad and the rate for Irish activities is very close to the 12.5% standard rate. The difficulty is that tax policies are designed for domestic audiences, on which each country has focused in designing its tax policies, but during the years businesses have become more and more international. They are operating across borders and can achieve lower tax rates globally, not in a particular country, because of the differences between the tax policies of different countries. The policies are not designed to knit neatly together, which is why we need to undertake the Base Erosion and Profit Sharing, BEPS, project. I do not think anybody is looking at the Irish corporation tax regime and saying there is a problem with it per se. Pascal Saint-Amans of the OECD has acknowledged that our regime is one of the broadest and most transparent in operation. The issue is not with the Irish regime but with the way it interacts with other tax rules, particularly those of the United States of America because of the very high level of US foreign direct investment here. It is a global issue; it is not just an Irish tax issue. Equally, it is not an issue that Ireland will be able to resolve on its own.