Micheál Martin
Question:3. Deputy Micheál Martin asked the Taoiseach if he was asked to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3274/15]
View answerTuesday, 23 June 2015
Questions (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
Gerry Adams
Question:4. Deputy Gerry Adams asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his visit to Davos in Switzerland; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4299/15]
View answerMicheál Martin
Question:5. Deputy Micheál Martin asked the Taoiseach if he met the President of Ukraine, Mr. Petro Poroshenko, while attending the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4302/15]
View answer
Joe Higgins
Question:6. Deputy Joe Higgins asked the Taoiseach if he will report on meetings he held with business leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland in January 2015. [5468/15]
View answerJoe Higgins
Question:7. Deputy Joe Higgins asked the Taoiseach if he will report on meetings he held with political leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland in January 2015. [5469/15]
View answerGerry Adams
Question:8. Deputy Gerry Adams asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his meetings with political leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland in January 2015; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15225/15]
View answerGerry Adams
Question:9. Deputy Gerry Adams asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his attendance at the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland in January 2015; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15226/15]
View answer
Richard Boyd Barrett
Question:10. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Taoiseach if he was invited to the World Economic Forum in Davos in Switzerland; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20233/15]
View answerOral answers (45 contributions)
I propose to answer Questions Nos. 3 to 10, inclusive, together.
I was invited by Professor Klaus Schwab to attend the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum and I travelled to Davos for 21 January to 23 January. The annual meeting is attended by political and business leaders and heads of international organisations from across the globe. The theme of this year’s meeting was "The new global context". On Wednesday evening, 21 January, I attended a function hosted by Professor Schwab, executive chairman of the forum, and this was also attended by other heads of government and the business council of the World Economic Forum. On the Thursday morning I participated in a high level plenary session to discuss economic growth and political stability in Europe. The other panellists in the discussion were Sigmar Gabriel, Vice Chancellor and Federal Minister of Economic Affairs and Energy of Germany; Prime Minister Mark Rutte of the Netherlands; Prime Minister Laimdota Straujuma of Latvia and the then Prime Minister of Finland, Alexander Stubb.
For the past four years, I have hosted an IDA Ireland dinner as part of Ireland's participation in the World Economic Forum. Each year, IDA Ireland has secured representation at the very highest levels from both existing and prospective foreign direct investment clients from some of the world’s largest multinational corporations and future technology leaders for this dinner event. There were 23 companies represented this year and these companies employ approximately 24,000 people in Ireland.
I outlined Ireland's path towards economic recovery and how we are steadily moving up the global competitiveness rankings. I emphasised that Ireland today is a key location of choice for manufacturing, services, research and development and strategic investments, noting also our young well educated and flexible workforce. I acknowledged the vital contribution that many of the companies represented had made to Ireland and to our economy and urged those who were looking at potential locations for investment or expansion to consider Ireland. IDA Ireland is actively following up on discussions regarding potential employment and investment projects with a number of these companies. I firmly support the IDA Ireland view that attendance at this event greatly enhances awareness of Ireland as a potential foreign direct investment location. In addition, I undertook media engagements alongside IDA Ireland, and held bilateral meetings with eight existing and prospective foreign direct investment companies, which employ approximately 700,000 globally and over 7,000 people in Ireland.
While in Davos, I had a bilateral meeting with Prime Minister John Key of New Zealand. I congratulated the Prime Minister on his return to office following the September elections in New Zealand. We discussed the excellent bilateral relations between Ireland and New Zealand and ways of expanding trade and investment between our two countries, noting that we both have small, open and vibrant economies. We also noted that our two countries are unique in the world in our agricultural practices and could benefit from information-sharing and expanded trade in this area. We discussed the challenges of hosting the Rugby World Cup and Ireland's bid to host part of the 2023 event.
I did not meet with the President of Ukraine in Davos.
The World Economic Forum provides an exceptional opportunity to interact with key players in the business world and I availed of every opportunity to promote Ireland as a key location for international business and investment. Participation in the World Economic Forum has helped achieve positive outcomes in terms of investment into Ireland in the past and will continue to do so.
I thank the Taoiseach for his reply. At the start we should note that most of these questions were tabled over five months ago. The delay is not just because of the nature of Taoiseach's Question Time. The Taoiseach halved the number of Taoiseach's questions periods when he came into government four years ago, taking out one day of Taoiseach's questions. He also does not reschedule when he cancels on a Tuesday. That has allowed a significant backlog to build up. I have asked him to address this, but nothing has been done over the past four years.
The Taoiseach spoke about the plenary session on economic growth that he attended and his main message at Davos was that Ireland was open for business and that he was not going to drift into populism. He said that at the time because it was before the general election in Greece. That promise did not last too long. I have noticed in his remarks that he creates a political narrative that suits his own party's situation. It is not today or yesterday that Ireland became a focal point for inward investment, particularly for high-end manufacturing. It is a policy that has been successfully implemented over a 30-year period, if not longer, in terms of both our place in Europe and our low corporation tax, which have been essential ingredients in attracting inward investment. He must accept that when he is talking to multinational companies, as he did in Davos, which employ 24,000 people, as he said, although of course many more thousands are employed than that, key reasons they are here are long-term investment in people, in our education system and research, and the long-term basis of key public policies, such as our pro-European Union position and our low corporation tax. The Taoiseach tends to place the emphasis on a shortened period and he does not talk up the consistency of long-term policy in Ireland, which is the cornerstone. That is what gives certainty to those who invest and have invested over a long period of time, particularly in the life sciences and technology - the Intels and Pfizers of this world. Does the Taoiseach share the view of multinational investors that long-term investment in people and ideas is central to why they are here?
That leads me to a further question. If the Taoiseach believes in that, and he knows that was a key theme at Davos, as it has been for many years, how can the disproportionate cuts to third and fourth level education help Ireland's reputation in attracting foreign direct investment? How can we face the chief executives with a straight face and talk up our investment in education and research while in reality there have been significant cuts to investment in third and fourth level education and research? Only a few months ago, an unprecedented letter from some of our most senior researchers across the country was published, which complained about the lack of funding for basic research in science. They said:
As scientists in Ireland and Irish scientists abroad, we are committed to making our contribution to Ireland’s recovery by doing the best and most innovative research possible. However, we are deeply concerned about the research policies implemented by the current Government. The policy of sustained investment in scientific excellence that helped build a vibrant scientific community in Ireland over the past 15 years has given way to a short-sighted drive for commercialisable research in a very limited set of prescribed areas.
I discussed that earlier in terms of the Cabinet committee. I do so now in terms of the key message of Davos. They also said:
Along with an investment in research that is below the EU average, steadily decreasing core grants to universities, and a constant demand to increase student numbers, these policies are creating a perfect storm for scientific research and education in Ireland and are undermining our abilities to carry out world-class research, to retain scientific talent in the country and also to educate future scientists and build a real and sustainable knowledge economy.
What they are saying flies in the face of the official pronouncements, the rhetoric and the political narrative and it is extremely worrying. Well over 100 scientists, both in Ireland and abroad, have put their names to this plea to sort out what is going on in third and fourth level and to change our policy, which is overly reliant on the applied side, ignoring the fundamental importance of basic research both to a proper third level system and to a proper research environment.
In addition, I was not just talking earlier about industrial relations in Ireland, but the absence of career pathways in Ireland for researchers. Researchers in Ireland are now expected to spend ten years without any contract or any security whatsoever. It is not sustainable in terms of building a world-class research environment. Many researchers will leave the country if something is not done about it. Many of the presentations at Davos, and the Taoiseach's own comments there, will mean very little if they are not backed up by a sustained, coherent science and research policy, which the Taoiseach currently does not have. That is the reason for the extraordinary situation I outlined earlier as described in an article written by Mike Jennings, who is the general secretary of the Irish Federation of University Teachers. I acknowledge he has an interest in representing his members, but he is saying that "[t]he vast majority of the estimated 5,000 full-time researchers attached to Irish higher-education institutions work on externally funded and temporary, insecure contracts" and the emphasis of the universities is on keeping them at one remove, short term and contractual. That is what is happening. If one talks to any researcher, they cannot get mortgages.
The Government says we want to become the beacon of research and to attract the best and the brightest to research. It says we want people to do PhDs, but it cut the funding for PhDs. I do not know why it did that. It cut the postgraduate research grants. It is an extraordinary, counterintuitive measure, which hardly mattered in terms of its impact on the public finances, yet the former Minister, Deputy Ruairí Quinn, went ahead and did it, aided and abetted by the Taoiseach. It all flies in the face of what the Taoiseach is saying on his plenary panels and at the plenary meetings. There is a contrast between rhetoric and reality. Language becomes meaningless when he reads out the prepared scripts to the great and the good at Davos, but back on the ranch, on the university campuses and in the Tyndalls of this world, the world-class researchers see they are being discriminated against in contrast to employees in secure positions in universities.
The Government is not serious about research and researchers. If one looks at all of the areas, from the Tyndall to NUI Galway and Maynooth University, right across the board the approach is that researchers are not a permanent part of the landscape. In fact, they are a temporary, insecure and revolving-door type operation, and the turnover is key.
This all flies in the face of European policy, the European research area, ERA, approach, the innovation Union and the Horizon 2020 programme that the former Commissioner, Ms Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, outlined last year, all of which emphasised attracting and retaining competent researchers. Giving them security was essential to a long-term impactful research policy. It needs an urgent response from Government because the reality on the ground is a far cry from the kind of high-flowing rhetoric that one articulates and hears at meetings such as Davos. I respectfully put it to the Taoiseach that the Government is living a lie on this one and there is no connection between the rhetoric and the reality on the ground.
I do not know whether the Taoiseach read the Oxfam report published before last year's Davos conference. It warned against global inequality and pointed out that the richest 1% would own more than the rest of the world's population by next year. At last year's Davos meeting, Oxfam reported that the 85 richest persons on the planet had the same wealth as the poorest 50% or 3.5 billion people. Inequality and the poverty that grows from it, I would argue, is the greatest threat to human progress and stability.
Looking at our own place, the Taoiseach should learn from what Oxfam has said. His Government has introduced dreadful policies without any consideration for the social consequences. There is no equality proofing. There is no attention paid to concerns being raised from the Opposition benches and perhaps, for all I know, from within the Government's ranks. The Taoiseach states we are in a recovery. Is that evident in public services, workers' rights, decent work for decent wages, terms and conditions and the eradication of poverty? No doubt these issues were debated and discussed at Davos, but one need only look at our own place, at the treatment of workers at Clerys and other workplaces in recent years during this recovery. One need only look at the plight of the Dunnes Stores workers as evidence of the failure of the Government - the Minister of State responsible is beside the Taoiseach - and Labour to introduce laws as it comes to the end of its term to protect workers.
We are enhancing employment. The ILO said it. Deputy Adams is misleading the House.
The Government's failure to introduce even its own flawed universal health insurance policy is evidence of the Government's failure to address social inequality and poverty, especially child poverty, or clamp down on tax abusers. In April, it was revealed that the breakfast cereal giant, Kellogg's, which routes a significant chunk of its global revenues through the State, paid only €7 million in corporation tax on more than €7.1 billion in sales from Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The Ceann Comhairle should think about that in the morning as he pours milk over his cereal. In 2003, this company paid no Irish tax because it stated it made a loss of €101 million on sales of €1.4 billion. There are lots of other examples of multinationals taking advantage of the State's low rates of effective corporation tax.
What did the Taoiseach say? The most infamous memory that most Irish people have of the Taoiseach at Davos some years before this was of him stating that "people went mad borrowing" in a system that spawned greed, went out of control and led to the crash. So the people were at fault, not the corrupt bankers, not the corrupt politicians, not the developers, not the golden circle. Those are who the Taoiseach said were at fault. I see no evidence of that in the people who have had to bear the brunt of the Government's austerity policies.
At this year's conference, the Taoiseach actually advised European leaders to stick with austerity and ignore growing demands for a more thoughtful and fair way to deal with State and European debt, and on the back of the election of Syriza in Greece, he warned of the dangers of a drift to populism. The Greek people, the very nation that led the foundations of democracy, had voted overwhelming for a government - by the way, as the people did with the Taoiseach's Government - that would stand up for the rights of citizens, and the Taoiseach, who has let the people down in terms of the mandate that he was given, described this as populism.
Would Deputy Adams put a few questions?
Is there a sense of the Taoiseach merely playing the game of being a time-server, going to these events, saying whatever one says at such events and then coming back here and continuing to inflict, and while engaging in the rhetoric of positivity, inflicting great negativity upon working people? The people of the State, like the people of Greece, had an unfair debt burden imposed upon them and it would be good, having failed to stand up for the rights of people here, if at least the Taoiseach supported positively the Greek proposals for a resolution to in some way redeem the Government for the way it has treated the people here in the years since he has come into office.
Ironically, one of the big issues at Davos this year was inequality. This discussion at Davos about inequality in the world was proceeded by the aforementioned Oxfam report that showed by next year the richest 1% of people in the world will own more wealth than everybody else in the world put together. There is a discussion about inequality against a background of obscene and gross inequality where a tiny group of people control the vast majority of wealth in the world while billions of people are starving, without homes, suffering extreme financial distress and suffering austerity. Those discussing austerity, along with the Taoiseach and the other leaders, were 100 billionaires who were invited to this event. They included our old friend, Mr. Denis O'Brien, worth €6 billion. Interestingly, according to The Sunday Times rich list, his wealth has doubled since the recession started. We have persons whose wealth is obscene beyond belief gathering together to discuss the evils of inequality in the world when those who are discussing it are the culprits. They are the ones responsible for the inequality because they, between them, have hoovered up more wealth than the vast majority of the world's population has. Does the Taoiseach agree that is quite obscene?
The Taoiseach, as a head of state, gets a free ticket but the tickets for the conference at Davos are $30,000 each.
There, the super rich - the world's richest people - along with heads of state and royalty discuss inequality. Not many of the victims of inequality will be getting in at $30,000 per ticket. The banquets and partying are pretty sumptuous according to reports.
Not really.
Those are the reports that I am reading, not that I would ever get into Davos or want to.
I was there once, but it was not sumptuous.
Does the Taoiseach believe it is appropriate to attend such a conference when it is a symbol of the gross inequality that has developed in the world? If we are in any way serious about the issue of inequality, we should have an aggressive policy of wealth redistribution. Did the Taoiseach come away from the conference with anything like that? Looking beyond the irony of these super rich people discussing inequality, did the Taoiseach conclude that we should perhaps increase taxes on them and their corporations so that we might have real wealth redistribution and make an impact on the gross gap between the rich and the poor? Has the Taoiseach come away from Davos with any intention of doing that?
I have raised the issue of corporate profits and how little corporations pay in taxes. We have seen a further example in the business section of today's The Irish Times. The Taoiseach should read it. It relates to the Covanta incinerator. Besides the fact that the elected representatives of Dublin opposed it, we have discovered-----
Maybe we will stick to the questions on Davos, please.
My point has to do with inequality and wealth. We have discovered that a shelf company has been set up in Luxembourg by the owners of Covanta. It is charging 13.5% interest on a loan-----
Come on, Deputy.
-----to Covanta such that Covanta's tax liability will be reduced to virtually nothing. Okay?
It is not okay, really. We are discussing Davos.
The point is that, after €100 million in public money has been invested in the project, Covanta will not contribute anything-----
That is a separate matter.
-----to the Exchequer. Aggressive tax avoidance, which we appear to be up to our necks in facilitating, is responsible for the gross inequality that was discussed at Davos despite the irony of hob-nobbing with the individuals who are benefitting from that inequality.
In all sincerity, does the Taoiseach recognise that this level of wealth inequality results from tax scams like that one and the obscene concentration of wealth in the hands of a few individuals, the very people who attended Davos? Having heard reports like the one I have just mentioned, has he any intention of radically moving in the direction of redistributing wealth through higher corporate and income taxes on these wealthy people? What does he propose to do about inequality, which is rampant in this country and across the world?
Will the Deputy allow the Taoiseach to reply?
We have had contributions from three formidable characters here, a Cheann Comhairle. First of all, I would say to Deputy Martin, Deputy Adams and the members of the Technical Group that, if they want and as I said before on many occasions, they can put down a priority question each week and I will answer it if it is an issue that they wish to follow through, and we can deal with the rest of the questions afterwards. There is the offer again for them. If they put down a priority question, I will be happy to deal with it in the ordinary way and follow through with ordinary questions afterwards. It is not good enough that we have to talk about these things five months on.
Deputy Martin went on about populism, long-term investment, high rhetoric and all the rest of it. I am very happy to attend the Davos conference. It is an opportunity to meet with people who have a real investment in this country, not brass plates but in real workers. I do not accept that from Deputy Martin, even if he were to provide it, as he called it, in high-flowing rhetoric in any kind of passage that he might either read or present. MasterCard, Facebook, Google, Bank of America, JETRO, Lone Star, AT&T, Novartis and Salesforce do not deal in that kind of stuff. What they deal with are facts, opportunity, attractiveness of location and people who provide a real opportunity to grow our economy by providing jobs. One of those companies, Salesforce, for instance, has gone from 100 employees to over 1,000 in the last number of years. It now has to move space again because of its growing workforce.
Is one expected not to speak to Bloomberg, Reuters, CNN or CNBC about our country and the international view of Ireland now as moving very much in the right direction where the issue of inequality can only be dealt with when one has a growing economy and one can spread the fruits of that throughout, particularly focusing on those who are more disadvantaged or those who are more vulnerable?
The fact of the matter is, as I have said to Deputy Martin before, here we are with a clear focus on research and innovation and on science-based activities, which have grown in strength over the last period. Given the colleges of technology, our universities, business and the school system, it has never been more advantageous or more exciting to be involved in the whole area of STEM and science and research and innovation. I do not accept the assertion from all of the scientists that this has gone back beyond where it was many years ago. It has grown in popularity and in strength.
No. They said that the Government got it wrong.
It has grown in recognition by those companies that come here for that reason. Why is it that the top ten companies in the world born on the Internet are here?
They were here before the Government entered office.
Why is it that all the pharmaceutical companies are here? Why is it that the financial services people want to come in here?
It is because they do not pay any tax.
Why is it that companies in the IT industry, every one of them, are here? It is because they recognise the talent pool of our young people coming through our educational system.
The Taoiseach has not done his research at all.
When I talk to them, they say it is not just the track record, it is not just the technology and it is not just the tax situation but it is the quality of the talent pool emerging from our school system,------
And the Government is putting it at risk.
Sorry, Deputy. Please.
-----from our educational system. That is paying serious dividends.
I would say to Deputy Boyd Barrett, obviously we have got rid of the double Irish concept because of reputational damage. Ireland plays its full part in the OECD analysis of the base erosion and profit sharing. We got rid of that because there are no brass plate companies here where we just have a plate but nobody employed. Apple, for instance, employs 4,000 people in Deputy Martin's city. There are so many others. Real workers go to work every day. They contribute to the research, innovation and the future. They are changing the frontiers up ahead.
In that sense, the Department of Finance, at the direction of the Minister, has now concluded its public consultation about putting in place an intellectual property knowledge box, which will be competitive and which will be fair, but which will play to win. We have made that point on so many occasions. We are very much up front about our tax situation. We will play hard and we will play to win in a fair sense.
Deputy Adams mentioned all these so-called superior people that he met. This is about talking to companies about investing in our country, where they have the opportunity to invest, create jobs and grow our economy and provide people with opportunities so that one can then deal with the more vulnerable sections of our society.
What is Sinn Féin doing in the North?
I might say to Deputy Adams, when I speak to the IDA or anybody else, I do not charge $500 a plate for the privilege of hearing my few words-----
The Taoiseach charges $5,000.
-----about how we might present our country in that sense.
It was $25,000 in Davos to eat from a plate.
Yes, Deputy Boyd Barrett, I am happy to attend at this function, and believe me - from what the Deputy is reading out there, I actually was in a very different place than all these sumptuous locations-----
There were no billionaires.
-----that the Deputy was talking about. This was strictly business, believe you me, from morning until evening. It is a great opportunity over 15-minute periods to meet people who have an interest in investing in Ireland, some of them quite new. In fact, I might say to the Deputy that some of those who attended at the location that I spoke in were AVG Technologies, Hewlett Packard, Marsh & McLellan Companies, the XL Group plc, AIG,-----
I did not know that the Taoiseach-----
Did the Taoiseach have drinks with Denis?
-----Huawei, Novartis, Palantir Technologies and Senn Delaney. Companies that were there before were Credit Suisse, Medtronic, Microsoft, Zurich Insurance, the McGraw-Hill founders, Bayer AG, Facebook, Accenture, Kaspersky Lab and Airbnb.
These are people who have invested their money here, who employ serious numbers of people and who have the opportunity to have a career, a contract and a really good opportunity to contribute to our country and grow it. For that reason, I make no apology for attending there and doing my business on behalf of the country as best I can.
I thank the Taoiseach.
Written Answers follow Adjournment.