Dáil debates

Wednesday, 7 September 2016

Government Appeal of European Commission Decision on State Aid to Apple: Motion

 

3:35 pm

Photo of Clare DalyClare Daly (Dublin Fingal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I agree with the points made by Deputy Connolly earlier when she said she felt a little sick listening to the debate. Never more has the disconnect between this House and the real lives of Irish citizens been more apparent - to me anyway - than today. We listened to the Taoiseach waffling on about our great small nation, our people and valiantly setting our shoulder to the wind. He spoke with words like sovereignty and independence but that is an insult to the people who led the way in trying to strive for Irish independence and equality.

I do not know if Members know but today is the 33rd anniversary of the passing of the eighth amendment. The Government has repeatedly told us there is no rush in dealing with the damage from that decision but meanwhile the British National Health Service does the job of our health service; "Spotlight" does the job of our State broadcaster in unearthing waste, political interference and corruption in industry; and the EU does the job of our Revenue Commissioners. That happens while the Government speaks about independence and sovereignty. It has some neck.

The Taoiseach told us this morning that we do not offer special favours or deals on tax; yes, we do. He said everyone is treated equally; no, they are not. There were people in my area who mistakenly filled out property tax returns when they had pyrite problems and had the Revenue Commissioners coming after them through no mistake of their own. There were single parents who did not declare PAYE and were hunted. They do not see the resources of the Government rowing into their defence to challenge the decision. Nevertheless, the limited resources needed by our people are seen as fit to squander in supporting one of the biggest multinationals on the planet.

It may be the case that the arrangement was legal and it was not exclusive to Apple. Is that not worse and should that not be the start rather than end of the matter? If that is the defence, the logic is that our laws are not just, economically or socially. Irish people have a right to know how many other companies have benefited from those arrangements and at what cost to hard-pressed Irish taxpayers. I can guarantee there is not a single small or medium-sized business that benefited from this arrangement. There is no benefit to a single small shopkeeper in my constituency in a property portfolio bought and sold to the likes of Cerberus, now being squeezed for every last drop of rent while those who bought the property do not pay any tax in this country.

They had no global profits to filter or launder and, as such, I guarantee that they did not benefit from these deals. By making the argument the Government does and defending what it is trying to do is to say that it is okay for corporations to pay negligible amounts of tax. It is not okay.

The debate has been a false one for much of today and in terms of what has gone on in the media over the last while. To appeal or not to appeal is actually not the question at all. Whether we should keep the windfall or will get some jobs out of it is really a bit of a red herring. What is at the heart of this debate is that Ireland has been shown to facilitate the transfer of wealth and the subsidisation of Apple shareholders with other people's money in return for a few coppers and a few pieces of silver. It is an insultingly small amount. Is it any wonder that Apple has cash reserves of over €230 billion when we facilitated a situation where it was not resident anywhere? Whether the money is claimed by Germany, the United States of America, France or somewhere else is not something I care about. It is the principle that multinationals should pay fair levels of taxation that must be fought for. The Government has some neck to go on about sovereignty when it is negotiating and facilitating a TTIP agreement and a CETA agreement and rolls over when the EU says we have to charge for water, saying "Okay, EU, we agree with you on that." Suddenly it is interested in sovereignty, when it could not care less about the sovereignty of the other EU states that set the taxation rates the Government facilitated Apple in avoiding. The Taoiseach is wrong when he says that the Government is determined to have the highest international standards of tax transparency. It is not prepared to do that. If it was, it would move to support the measures in our motion. They are not waffle. They are concrete on country-by-country reporting and full transparency. Of course, the Government is not going to do that, but will continue to facilitate very wealthy people at the expense of taxpayers, not just in Ireland but internationally.

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