Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am taking this issue on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Finance and for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Donohoe. The Minister is aware of the publication by media outlets of information deriving from the Paradise Papers. The Paradise Papers are not currently publically available but the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, ICIJ, has indicated that it intends to release them in the coming weeks.

To the extent that these or any similar papers identify individuals or entities associated with Ireland, Revenue will examine the cases and intervene as appropriate. At an international level, Revenue will also work in close co-operation with other tax administrations within the framework of the OECD’s Joint International Taskforce on Shared Intelligence and Collaboration, in addressing issues raised by the papers and will, as appropriate, share information under existing legal frameworks. The Minister for Finance has confidence that any issues of concern will be investigated by the Revenue Commissioners, as appropriate, as soon as the papers become available.

On the media references to the Irish banks, as the Deputy is aware the Minister for Finance has no direct function in strategic or operational decisions made by the banks in which the State is a shareholder. Decisions in this regard are the responsibility of the board and management of each institution, under the supervision of their regulator and equivalent authorities in the jurisdictions relevant to their operations. The Minister must ensure that the bank is run on a commercial and independent basis and in this regard a relationship framework has been specified that defines the nature of the relationship between the Minister for Finance and the bank. As the Deputy is aware, these frameworks can be found on the Department of Finance website.

The Deputy will be aware that AIB has indicated it does not support or facilitate tax evasion and acts in accordance with all relevant tax and data protection laws in any jurisdiction in which it operates. Under the terms of its EU restructuring plan, AIB was tasked with becoming a simpler, smaller and more domestically-focused banking group, to ensure its stability and return to viability. AIB previously had banking operations in many jurisdictions around the world and provided a range of standard banking services to its international customers. As part of the EU restructuring plan commitments, the bank made the decision to dispose of some of these operations, such as its Polish subsidiary, and close others, which included the winding down of their operations in the Isle of Man and Jersey. The bank has confirmed to the Minister for Finance that it was decided to wind down AIB ISL Limited in the Isle of Man and AIB (CI) Limited in Jersey in 2012 and they ceased operations on 31 December 2013. The banking licence of both companies was terminated and the administration of both, which is a legal and regulatory requirement as part of the orderly wind-down of the banking operations, was migrated to and continues to be carried out by two companies, namely, Estera Trust (Isle of Man) Limited and Estera Trust (Jersey) Limited. The bank has also advised the Minister that it fully complied with a series of disclosure orders made by the High Court In Dublin between 2004 and 2012 in favour of the Revenue Commissioners in respect of information held by the bank’s Irish operations as part of Revenue’s offshore products investigation.

Bank of Ireland has advised the Minister for Finance that it is its group’s policy to fully comply with all the requirements as set out in tax legislation in the countries in which it operates. The group is also committed to maintaining open and co-operative relationships with the relevant tax authorities in the jurisdictions in which it operates. To this end, the bank has informed the Minister for Finance that the group has signed up to and operates within the co-operative compliance framework with the Revenue Commissioners and the equivalent banking code of practice on taxation with the UK's HM Revenue and Customs. The group closed the last of its retail operations in the Channel Islands in June 2014 following a general business review.

Significant action has been taken, in Ireland and internationally, in respect of offshore activity in recent years. Revenue originally launched an investigation into offshore activity in 2003 and has collected more than €1 billion in tax, interest and penalties to date as part of this investigation. Changes were also made in 2016 to the voluntary disclosure tax regime. Since that change, the Minister for Finance is advised by Revenue that the number of disclosures exceeds 2,700, with a value of more than €80 million. As already noted, as soon as any information becomes available it will be closely examined by the Revenue Commissioners.

See this speech in context