Dublin South West Sinn Féin TD, Seán Crowe, has welcomed the announcement that the Oireachtas Finance Committee will hold hearings to discuss the issue of the low rates of effective corporation tax paid by multinational companies based in Ireland. Sinn Féin contacted the Committee in November to request the hearing.

Crowe said that the findings of the US Senate Committee, which described Ireland as a tax haven and suggested that Apple also has a special agreement with the Irish Government to reduce its Irish tax bill to 2%, as a national scandal.

Deputy Seán Crowe said:

“The initial findings by a US Senate Committee that suggest the multinational giant Apple are using Ireland to massively write-off its international tax bill is an absolute scandal.

“The Committee found that Apple set up an Irish incorporated non-resident entity to handle 30% of its global earnings, and then effectively pay tax nowhere.

“The suggestion that the same multinational has a “special arrangement with the Irish Government to reduce its domestic corporation tax rate to 2%”, is also scandalous.

“The Senate Committee recently described Ireland as a tax haven. This is not something that any Irish Government should be ignoring or dismissing as not their problem.

“The issue of large multinational corporations like Apple and Google not paying the effective tax rates in Ireland, or using Ireland as a vehicle to avoid paying tax internationally, is prominent in the news now, but it’s something Sinn Féin have been highlighting for a quite a while now.

“Sinn Féin contacted the Oireachtas Finance Committee as far back as November and requested hearings on this issue which are due to commence shortly.

“We have suggested a number of experts in this field should be invited to the Committee, as well as the Irish representatives of leading multi-national companies, to answer serious and straight forward questions.

“Ireland’s economy has benefitted from foreign direct investment in terms of jobs and payroll taxes. These jobs have to be protected, but not at any price.

“If Ireland is perceived as a tax haven that is not beneficial to us in the long-term, in either jobs or tax take. It also undermines our international reputation, which honest taxpayers are supposedly currently sacrificing so much for.

“This Government continues to protest that our tax system is transparent. Our tax code would appear to many, to have been written for the benefit of large companies and the wealthiest in society.

“Massive global multinational are benefiting while small and medium enterprises, and individuals on low and middle incomes, are obliged to pay their tax demands in full.

“PAYE workers haven’t the luxury of tax breaks or the ability to negotiate reduced tax bills through complex global systems.

“There cannot be one law for big multinational companies and another for small businesses. This is what we want to get to the bottom of at these Committee hearings.

“The Committee hearings will give us an opportunity to shine a light on dodgy tax structures, the dodgy nod and wink secret sweetheart deals for larger companies, and reveal once and for all if they are playing the game fairly.”

ENDS