Results 20,761-20,780 of 26,953 for speaker:Richard Boyd Barrett

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I agree with many of the Chairman's comments.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: We flew through section 36-----

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I am allowed, within Standing Orders, to signal a matter for Report Stage.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: It is relevant to this discussion, and that prompted me to think about it. I have concerns about real estate investment trusts similar to the ones expressed about this. I will return to that on Report Stage. I worry that we are going down that road. While they are at the bottom and it might be the real price, the people who have money are buying up at the bottom of the market and...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I signal a possible Report Stage amendment to section 42.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I believe we need to drill into that.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: It would be desirable to explain in the report, whose production I would welcome, the comparisons between the implicit rates in various countries in Europe. I do not fully understand-----

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: The Minister of State is saying the gap between the €70 billion and the €40 billion is explained by reference to the three outlined categories and that the write-offs are fully legitimate because they pertain to capital allowances or royalties, for example, and are in accordance with international standards. I do not understand how our implicit figure is so low compared with...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I welcome the fact that we are having this discussion. However, the point is that it needs to develop and get beyond the assertion of different positions which at present do not agree. There are different starting points, but I am glad the Minister of State wants more from them because I want more. I say upfront that these guys should pay more.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: Let us be honest, every other group in Irish society has been scrutinised intensely over the past four or five years to extract more. Rightly or wrongly, that is what has happened. The same level of scrutiny needs to be applied to these corporations. Broadly speaking, the question I want answered, on which I got some information but which has not really been answered, relates to that big...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I want to know how they write it off.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I want each one of those categories examined. I want to see how it is enforced. I want to see the criteria through which they qualify for those allowances. I want to see if there are possible ways in which they are abusing those categories in order to reduce their tax liability. I want an explanation as to why what is known as the implicit rate in the EUROSTAT figures is considerably...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I think they do. Those tables were extremely detailed. They showed GDP, amounts of tax paid, and everything. Those are extremely detailed tables. They showed corporate taxes paid. It had figures for these matters and it gave implicit rates. It was self-evident, unless it was an extraordinary co-incidence, that the €6.5 billion EUROSTAT had as an implicit rate for Ireland happened...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: As the Minister is aware, I have challenged the Government consistently on this issue in the past year or two and the very least it could do is accede to a request to provide the analysis and assessment Deputy Doherty has suggested in order that we can have the hard evidence before us and the public. That would allow them make their own judgments on this issue. There is considerable...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: God forbid these companies might decide to pay a little more tax somewhere, perhaps even in Ireland. I know that would be unthinkable for them and perhaps for the Minister also.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: I am very glad that is starting to be said. It is a major sea change and well past time that it should happen. I will be pleasantly surprised if real action to move matters in that direction which matches the rhetoric to that which we have been treated is forthcoming. Let us hope we are moving in a positive direction. Members wanted representatives from the companies in question to come...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: It goes to show that if one kicks up a bit of a fuss about something, it can produce some movement. As the Minister knows, I have been kicking up for some time about the scandalous situation where corporations which make vast profits every year in this country pay little or no tax. The provision is welcome in that context, but it is slightly alarming that the Minister has put off its...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: If only ordinary workers could get such a tax break we would be flying.

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: Much of my objection is to how this frames a relationship with the banks in general, and the different rules that applied to banks, and for that matter, to corporations, because a more general aspect to this is the capacity of private corporations to bring forward losses from previous years. Many people here bought houses just to put a roof over their head at the top of the property bubble,...

Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform: Select Sub-Committee on Finance: Finance (No. 2) Bill 2013: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 Nov 2013)

Richard Boyd Barrett: The Minister has pointed to the fact that we effectively own AIB and have a substantial share in Bank of Ireland as part of the rationale for doing this. He implies it is in the public interest to do this and to create a level playing field for the banks in which we have a stake in the wider banking market. I would put it completely differently. These banks were making astronomical profits...