Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy has touched on the key issues in the tax debt warehousing regime. It is important that we are as flexible as possible. The overall principle is that this tax debt will be treated very differently from other tax debt. It is important that businesses continue to file their current returns on time and meet their current taxation liabilities. On that basis, the Revenue Commissioners will be very flexible with businesses. It is important to emphasise that the requirement here is not to pay the warehoused debt by 1 May, which I have heard reported. The requirement is to engage with Revenue and agree a plan which will be worked out and implemented over a number of years. I believe that additional flexibilities are warranted. Trading conditions are very challenging for a lot of businesses in different sectors. This is a legacy of Covid and I expect to finalise it very shortly.

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