Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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10. To ask the Minister for Finance the position regarding the formal investigation being undertaken by the European Commission into Ireland's corporation tax arrangements with a company (details supplied); if the Irish authorities have co-operated fully with the investigation; the investigation will be concluded; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4669/15]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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Last year, the Competition Directorate of the European Commission announced their intention to open formal state aid investigations into tax rulings provided to a number of companies in various Member States of the European Union. 

This announcement is part of a much wider review of tax ruling practice that is currently being undertaken by the European Commission and recently the Commission announced that it was broadening its enquiries to include all Member States.  

As the Commission have acknowledged, Ireland has co-operated fully with the process to date and will continue to do so.

I would like to emphasise that, while the Commission has opened a formal investigation in relation to one particular case involving Ireland, it has not made a final determination in the matter.  For state aid to exist in this case, less tax must have been charged to the company than should have been applied under our domestic legislation, and this must have distorted competition within the single market. 

As part of this formal investigation, the Commission wrote to Ireland to ask for our response to their concerns in relation to the particular case.    Ireland has responded to this letter, comprehensively addressing the Commission's concerns and making it clear that the appropriate amount of Irish tax was charged in accordance with the relevant legislation, that no selective advantage was given and that there was no state aid. This is a confidential matter between Ireland and the Commission and I am not in a position to comment on the specific details of our response as the matter is subject to a formal process of investigation and relates to a specific taxpayer.

While it would not be appropriate to speculate on the outcome at this stage, I remain confident that there was no breach of State aid rules in this case and that the legislative provisions were correctly applied. The Commission have indicated publicly that they expect to make their final decision on this issue in the first half of 2015.

After an investigation such as this, the Commission may decide that there is no state aid after a Member State provides the additional information and clarification.

However, in the event that the Commission forms the view that there was state aid, Ireland is entitled to challenge this decision in the European Courts.  As I and my colleagues in Government have already indicated, we will take that course of action, if necessary, to continue to vigorously defend the Irish position.