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

How many of the workers the Deputy referred to are employed by the corporations to which he also referred? Many of those corporations are very large employers employing a large share of the workers he correctly identified. We receive income tax on the salaries those corporations pay those workers. We receive tax from the investments those corporations make here. It comes back to the challenge we face in that many other countries are competing for the level of foreign direct investment we have here. The benchmark for what the corporate tax rate should be, which as the Deputy is aware we are planning to increase for the largest companies, is not just how much revenue can be accrued through changes in rates, but also the need for that rate to be competitive with that of other countries. I acknowledge we have a low rate of corporate tax of 12.5%, albeit it will increase. The reason for that, in turn, is to create a country in which we have more people at work than otherwise we would have.

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