Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I recall in November 2016 that I was an MEP when the Fine Gael Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael Noonan, attended the European Parliament's economic and monetary affairs committee. I asked him about the so-called double Irish, one of the many practices that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael had created to allow the wealthiest corporations in the world avoid paying their taxes. The scheme at that stage was being finally brought to an end but Fine Gael had given a longer phase-out period than was needed so companies could avoid paying their taxes just that bit longer. I simply asked the then Minister for Finance how he could justify that and his response in front of MEPs from across Europe and the world's media was that I should wear the green jersey. It was an embarrassing response on his part but it was very telling because Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil have brought patriotism to equate supporting large corporations, global tax avoiders, vulture funds and corporate landlords. So it was that when the European Commission directed that the Irish people were owed more than €13 billion in taxes by Apple, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil put on their shade of green jersey. They went all in, or rather, they put the Irish people all in. They spent millions of taxpayers' euro in a desperate attempt to deny our communities funding that could have saved them from some of the crueler cuts Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael were inflicting. I often wonder how different this country would have been if we had had a different government with the right priorities and if we had a government that stood up to EU diktats when it came to bailing out the banks and penalising Irish workers, families and communities with savage austerity. Instead, these guys became the patriots only when it was to stand up for multinational corporate tax avoiders but never to stand up for the Irish people. Let us make no mistake that this is why we have lost and are still losing many of our brightest young people to Toronto, Sydney and Dubai. It is why we are paying the price in the housing crisis, in the crises in our health and disability services. It is why, despite the fact the Government is spending record level of taxpayers' money, it has virtually nothing of substance to show for it. The Apple debacle and all that it encompasses demonstrates more than anything the need for change. It demonstrates the need for a government that puts people first, invests these Apple moneys in the communities that were impacted by the cuts that these parties imposed and for a government that will put on the green jersey for the Irish people.

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