Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Our receipts projections indicate the amount of corporation profit tax that we will take in this year will be less than what we took in last year. Again, it was prudent not to assume the graph would always go up and we are basing our projections on the graph turning and receipts going down this year.

We have also increased capital spending, and there has been a 25% increase in capital spending this year, with a further 10% increase next year. That equates to €700 million. Capital spending is different from current spending as once a school or hospital is built, it is built. We do not need to rebuild these every year. We are putting much more into capital spending and public infrastructure because it is needed but also because we understand that those receipts from corporation profit tax might not always be there so we should not spend it on things like pay increases, which must be paid every year. We should spend it on one-off projects like capital projects, which is exactly what we have done.

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