Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The existing provision is very narrow. It was introduced solely as an anti-avoidance measure to prevent certain behaviours where abuses where occurring in the transfer of assets while seeking to avoid paying capital gains tax. That anti-abuse measure has been successful and Revenue is not aware of any revenue stream that has been generated by this tax. The behaviour changed so the tax did not generate revenue. This is not simply a replacement for that exit tax, which was a specific measure designed to stop a certain type of behaviour. This will be a new tax measure, effective from tonight, and will apply to the removal of assets from Ireland. These will be intellectual property assets rather than immovable assets such as land or buildings because they would still be liable for corporate gains tax in Ireland when sold. This measure would apply to assets moved out of Ireland which, unless this tax was introduced, would not represent a disposal and therefore would not be liable for any tax.

This measure was agreed with the European Union and is part of a broad range of anti-avoidance taxes we are introducing, including measures against controlled foreign companies, measures against hybrid transactions or entities and measures against interest abuses, which were advocated as being in conformity with the base erosion and profit sharing, BEPS, measures developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. These are measures the EU is taking which we have also agreed to take. It is being introduced now so that it will be effective from tonight. It is obviously prudent, when a tax of this nature is introduced, that it is introduced and implemented rather than introduced and then left for a large period of time. Such a measure could lead to transactions being executed specifically to avoid this impact. By introducing it in this way we avoid the possibility of gaming the regime. We need certainty in this area; the Coffey report on corporation tax advocated that certainty should prevail.

Deputy Howlin asked why we are not projecting significant revenues from this measure.

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