John Curran (Dublin Mid West, Fianna Fail)

The Finance Bill as presented does a lot to facilitate business. I am pleased to see some aspects which will help to encourage the establishment of small businesses in particular. One specific change concerns corporation tax whose threshold has been raised from €150,000 to €200,000 for small companies. The VAT rate increase thresholds have also been raised to €37,500 for services and €75,000 for goods. When times were good and things were booming here, nobody needed to take a chance in establishing their own businesses, and these types of supports were welcome. A former Deputy from Tipperary, Noel Davern, was always a strong advocate of assisting and encouraging small indigenous business by cutting red tape as far as possible. The Minister has proceeded along those lines in this budget by removing bureaucratic red tape to enable individuals to establish small businesses. Some of the moves the Minister has made in that regard are to be commended because they will help such businesses to get up and running.

It is worth noting that before the general election——

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