Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I was involved in all of the discussions about this, as one would expect me to be on any of the discussions about income tax policy or broader tax policy. The Deputy is correct to say that there are many competing pressures on the Exchequer currently but in many areas of public expenditure levels of expenditure and recruitment are equal to those in the pre-crisis period and in some case ahead of those levels. When I look at the trends within our economy I see that if we do not move our tax structure in line with income growth, a situation will develop whereby more low income earners will end up paying the higher rate of income tax. This is why I believe this is a targeted, focused change. Resources are available and I will be taking account of Brexit. I will talk to the House about a disorderly Brexit and other scenarios next week. I re-state that all of our commitments from a tax point of view and otherwise depend on an economy that is performing well, a degree of economic growth and, as long as that is there, I believe it is possible, year after year, to make progress on this objective.

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