I compliment Deputy McNamara on the drafting of this amendment. It is a masterpiece of drafting and I am sure had to be read on many occasions by those souls who judge what is acceptable and not acceptable before they realised it was acceptable. To speak to the substantial matter Deputy McNamara raises, the primary qualifying criterion for the employment wage subsidy scheme is that the employer must be able to demonstrate that the business is operating at no more than 70% in either the turnover of the employer's bu…

I will be, but Deputies have raised an array of issues.

I appreciate that. I thank the Deputies for the variety of matters they have raised. I will deal with each of them in turn. I will deal first with the amendment tabled by Deputy Doherty. I am very much aware of the issue the Deputy has raised. His point was that different parts of our economy are now beginning the slow journey into recovery at very different speeds. For some parts of our economy that will be a long journey; a journey some have not yet begun. That is why we are making changes to the temporary wage s…

I never said I had the ability to bring in a different percentage contribution for which Deputy Doherty is calling. I simply made the point that I have the ability to vary some of the operation of this scheme during its lifetime. I also know many people, as does the Deputy, who are in part-time work and who have many different employers. I take his point that it is unlikely they will go from two hours to ten hours. It is possible, however, that the employer of somebody who is on ten hours may decide to employ them …

I thank Deputy Boyd Barrett for his questions. I am not passing anything off. I am introducing an economy-wide scheme. What is implicit in bringing in an economy-wide scheme is that I am not at this point proposing to bring in anything that is different sector by sector. I think it is clear in this legislation that we are looking to introduce a scheme that benefits as many people as possible. I would have thought that would have been welcomed. I think the Deputy has welcomed it in the contributions he has made. Eve…

I want to be clear; this Bill will be implemented as passed by the House. I am advised by the Revenue Commissioners that the reference to directors in the Bill that is causing concern is an important compliance measure. As I have told Deputy O'Donnell and others, I have received correspondence on this issue in the past 24 hours. The Bill will be implemented as intended and as passed by the House but I will have a look at the issue before that happens because it is not my intention to penalise or to cause difficulty…

The Deputy's amendment seeks to restrict the hiring practices of employers who access the temporary wage subsidy scheme, the employment wage subsidy scheme or the special warehousing and interest provisions of the Bill. The amendment proposes that entry to such schemes would mean such employers would not be able to hire new workers to fill roles vacated due to layoffs or to hire new workers unless the work they are hired to carry out has been already offered to increase the hours of short-time workers. These scheme…

Deputy Doherty knows I do not have that power.

The order is fixed already.

I congratulate the Leas-Cheann Comhairle on her election. I welcome the opportunity to comment on the recent judgment of the General Court of the European Union. It was always important that the State challenged this decision and did not accept the Commission's reasoning, as some in this House and elsewhere wanted. The decision of the previous Government to appeal the Commission decision was based on our strong conviction that Ireland did not give favourable tax treatment to Apple and that no state aid was provided…

I thank the Deputy for his good wishes on my new role. I look forward to working with Members of the Dáil and with finance Ministers across Europe over the next two and a half years. To deal with the Deputy's question, the members of the Banking and Payments Federation of Ireland, BPFI, introduced a payment break for their customers on 18 March last. These payment breaks were agreed quickly to provide substantial and rapid relief to worried and anxious borrowers, including mortgage holders, in situations where inco…

It was my job as this issue was developing to work with the banks to ensure provisions were put in place to allow payment breaks to be given to mortgage and loan holders at a time when they needed them the most. When we were facing into this period, we were looking at a public health crisis and an economic emergency. As a result of the work done by the Department of Finance and me and the work done by the Central Bank and the other banks, in recognition of the huge challenges people were facing, we were able to put…

The Deputy will be aware that the General Court of the European Union annulled the European Commission's state aid decision of 30 August 2016 with respect to Apple. The court concluded that the Commission in its decision had failed to demonstrate that by issuing the opinions in 1991 and 2007, the Irish authorities had granted the two Apple companies, ASI and AOE, a selective advantage. The court rejected all three lines of argument put forward by the Commission and overturned the Commission's 2016 decision that Ire…

In pursuing this issue, the only interest I have had in mind is that of the many hundreds of thousands of people who work in very large companies in this country. At a time of economic turmoil, when we are seeing rates of employment and rates of income change very quickly, the only interest I have had, in three years of dealing with this matter, is how we can continue to stand over an approach that does two things. First, it is part of a legitimate model of competitiveness in which taxation plays a part and which a…

What I want is to have the tax revenue available to pay for public services and to, for example, generate a huge income subsidy support plan over a matter of days that played a role in hundreds of thousands of jobs being retained. I want to have the tax revenue to allow us to bring in payments like the pandemic unemployment payment. My interest is in having the tax revenue to deliver the public services that both I and Deputy Murphy want, as well as the jobs to keep our country at work and provide a good standard o…

Companies in Ireland are mainly taxed at the standard corporation tax rate of 12.5%. Different methodologies are used and while some of them lead to different claims regarding our tax rate, it is important to look at recent work done by the Revenue Commissioners, which published an updated analysis of returns filed in 2018. They noted that the effective rate of tax paid by all companies in Ireland is 10.6%, while it is 11.3% for the top ten companies and 10.8% for the top 100. It is important to put those facts on …

I have already relayed to the House my views on unanimity and the need for national sovereignty regarding particular tax matters to continue to be recognised by the European Union. I will continue to hold that view in the future, as I expect this House will as well. In fairness to the Deputy, while he may have raised questions regarding the speed at which change has been brought in and the motivation for that change, he has interrogated me on and at times welcomed the changes that have been made in recent finance B…

I will use my role as the Minister for Finance for Ireland to pursue what I believe are longstanding clear matters for our national interest. That is what I have done in recent years and it is what I will continue to do. I will respond at another point to the ruling concerning anti-money laundering, but in the brief answers I have given to the Deputy, I have pointed to that vast amount of change that has happened in our corporate tax code to deal with aggressive tax planning and practices that I know need to change…

I absolutely appreciate the concerns many people are experiencing about mortgage applications and drawdowns at a difficult time, and my Department and I are maintaining close contact with the Central Bank and the Banking and Payments Federation Ireland, BPFI, as the lending industry works to address the difficulties Covid-19 is causing for both borrowers and lenders. The Central Bank has advised that it expects all regulated firms to take a consumer-focused approach and to act in their customer's best interests at …

I understand the concerns of Deputy McAuliffe's constituents, Derek and Sandra. I want to be in a position to ensure that if a loan is made available to Derek and Sandra, they will always be in a position to be able to repay that loan without facing additional financial hardship or difficulty. We are all aware of the huge stress and anxiety that can also be caused by the development of debt and by issues relating to mortgage arrears, and I am looking to ensure that a balance is achieved between the granting of mort…