Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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150. To ask the Minister for Finance if he will calculate the additional revenue that would be raised by introducing the EU Commission's proposed financial transaction tax; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28558/14]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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The Government's position is that a financial transaction tax would be best applied on a wide international basis to include the major financial centres to prevent the danger of activities gravitating to jurisdictions where taxes are not levied on financial transactions.

In any event it is not possible to estimate the extra revenue that would be raised by introducing the EU Commission's proposed financial transaction tax until such time as the final form of the tax is settled.

A proposal for a Directive from the European Commission in the area of financial transaction tax was published in February 2013. Ireland had many concerns about the proposal as drafted, not least of which were the potential impacts on, and the trading of, Irish Sovereign debt in the secondary market and in total, the potential negative impact on the liquidity of the financial sector as a whole. Members of the Economic and Financial Sub-Committee on EU Sovereign Debt Markets have stated that the introduction of the FTT would have a significantly negative effect on Sovereign Debt Markets and may impair the good-functioning of secondary markets for sovereign debt resulting in reduced liquidity, reduced investor demand and therefore higher financing costs for States.

Our concerns are widely shared amongst the Member States, including some of the participating Member States. These concerns have led to the recent issuing of a communique by the participating Member States, announcing that they have agreed to implement a financial transaction tax in a progressive manner, with the first step being a charge on shares and some derivatives. However, significant technical and legal discussions will continue to be required at the Council Working Party before the text of the proposed Directive can be finalised. With this in mind, the targeted implementation date for the FTT has been rescheduled to 1 January 2016.

As the Deputy will be aware, Ireland already has a tax on certain financial transactions - a Stamp Duty on transfers of shares in Irish incorporated companies - which currently stands at 1%.  The yield from this charge in 2013 was €251 million.