Mr. Seamus Coffey:

I might have a surprising answer to what the Deputy thought was a surprising question but I think they would have relatively little in that respect. Our corporation tax regime does not seem to bounce around and change to the whims of those companies. We introduced a 12.5% rate. We announced it the 1990s, introduced it in the early 2000s and it has been in place ever since. There have not been significant changes to the underlying system. There have been some changes and I am sure the large companies and their representative bodies make submissions to the Department of Finance and try to get the ear of the Minister to make various changes, but I am not sure that Irish policy is dancing fully to the beat of the requirements of foreign companies. The evidence in the planning area, in particular, during the past few weeks, or perhaps months or years, however long that process has been going on, would suggest the influence may not be as large as some would believe.

There is no doubt we have developed an industrial policy based on attracting foreign companies to Ireland, a key plank of which is taxation but it is not the only plank. If taxation was the most important element, all those companies would locate in Bermuda where there is no tax, but they are locating in countries like Ireland which has a low corporation tax rate of 12.5%. However, a country needs to have much more than that to attract such investment. It needs to have the availability of staff and a reputation to attract the location of these large plants that generate all the commercial rates that the Deputy mentioned. If they are going to spend hundreds of millions or even billions of euro on these plants, they want them operating and producing the products they want to make. We have built a reputation over 30 or 40 years for delivering on these projects. It involves much more than just getting the ear of the Minister. Rather than focusing on the political side, one of the key actors is IDA Ireland, on the agency side, having an interaction with a company, not necessarily changing things but it is nice for those companies to know there is an agency they can contact and have a contact person within it with which they can deal. The activity there, as much as changing things in the background, is important. We can point to the change in the low tax rate but from our perspective, we are benefitting in that we are getting employment and investment. There is no doubt but that changes have been introduced on foot of proposals made by companies but I do not believe our regime is dancing to the beat of what any particular multinational might be saying.