Alan Kelly
Question:4. Deputy Alan Kelly asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his telephone call with the UK Prime Minister. [15772/20]
View answerWednesday, 15 July 2020
Questions (4, 5, 6, 7, 47)
Alan Kelly
Question:5. Deputy Alan Kelly asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his telephone call with the German Chancellor. [15905/20]
View answerAlan Kelly
Question:6. Deputy Alan Kelly asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his engagement with the President of the European Commission. [15906/20]
View answer
Mick Barry
Question:7. Deputy Mick Barry asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the discussions he has had with other Heads of Government since he assumed his position. [16088/20]
View answerAlan Kelly
Question:47. Deputy Alan Kelly asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his engagement with the President of the European Council. [15907/20]
View answerOral answers (9 contributions)
I propose to take Questions Nos. 4 to 7, inclusive, and 47 together.
Since taking office, I have spoken with leaders, including the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, the United Kingdom's Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, the Dutch Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, the Portuguese Prime Minister, António Costa, and the President of Lithuania, Gitanas Nauseda. I also spoke with the European Union's chief negotiator on Brexit, Michel Barnier, and with the Commission Vice-President, Maros Sefcovic.
I had a video conference with the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, on 1 July, ahead of this week's meeting of the European Council. President Michel set out his approach to negotiations on the next generation European Union recovery proposal and on the multi-annual financial framework for 2021 to 2027 and suggested where compromise will be necessary to make agreement possible. I set out Ireland's support for an ambitious European Union recovery fund and emphasised that the fund should be targeted at those regions and sectors most affected by the Covid crisis. On the multi-annual financial framework, I reiterated Ireland's strong position on the importance of an adequately resourced Common Agricultural Policy. I also stated that the European Union should be in a position to offer support to those member states most affected by Brexit, including Ireland.
I spoke to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, on 30 June. I noted the strong alignment between the programme for Government and European Union priorities, including climate action and the digital agenda. We also agreed that it was important to reach early agreement on the recovery fund and the multi-annual financial framework. On Brexit, I expressed my appreciation for the support Ireland has received from the Commission and for the excellent co-operation with the Commission team led by Michel Barnier. I expressed my appreciation directly to Michel Barnier in my call with him.
I spoke with the German Chancellor, Dr. Merkel, on 2 July, when we discussed Brexit and the European Union's response to Covid-19. I took the opportunity to wish the Chancellor well with Germany's European Union Presidency.
My calls with the Prime Ministers, Mr. Rutte and Mr. Costa, and President Nauseda of Lithuania, covered current European Union issues, including the recovery fund and the multi-annual financial framework, as well as the Covid crisis.
Where appropriate, in my calls I sought support for the Minister for Finance's successful candidacy for the presidency of the Eurogroup. I congratulate him on his success. I spoke with the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, on 30 June. Our discussion covered Covid-19 and our respective plans to deal with its impact on the economy, employment and society. We also discussed Brexit. We agreed to work closely with regard to Northern Ireland as co-guarantors of the Good Friday Agreement and on strengthening bilateral relations, especially in the post-Brexit era. We look forward to meeting in the near future.
I thank the Taoiseach. As he will know, I come from and represent a Border constituency. It is no exaggeration to say that Brexit is a massive concern. It is always in the background. Those concerns have only been compounded by the current public health and economic crises caused by Covid-19. What precisely did the UK Prime Minister say to the Taoiseach about the prospect of a deal during their phone call? Did the Taoiseach raise with the German Chancellor Irish concerns about the size of the EU financial package and the prospect of a special €5 billion fund for the countries, such as Ireland, which will be most adversely affected by Brexit? Does the Taoiseach expect that the EU budget and recovery package will be agreed at the next European Council meeting?
The Taoiseach mentioned the discussion he had with the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. Did the issue of the Apple tax judgment come up in that discussion? He mentioned in the previous round that he felt the left has been niggardly in acknowledging the role of foreign direct investment. I would argue that the right has been niggardly in accepting and acknowledging that the level of tax paid by the Apple corporation in this State was unacceptable. I understand that the General Court of the European Union in Luxembourg today ruled that Ireland did not give Apple illegal state aid. I do not believe the court challenged the level of tax Apple paid in the period from 2003 to 2014 in particular. The Taoiseach can correct me if I am wrong. It paid corporation tax at 1% in 2003 and at 0.005% in 2014. In fact, the court seems to say that, rather than being illegal, that completely, totally and absolutely unacceptable level of tax was legal. That would say something about the law in this country and the way in which it is fixed in favour of big multinational corporations at the expense of society. This tax, even if paid at the low rate of 12.5%, would represent a serious sum of money which could and should be used for our health service, our education service and to reduce inequality within society. Did that feature in the Taoiseach's discussion?
For the record, I wish to reflect on the fact that the Taoiseach has not answered the very straightforward question I put to him. From the record of the Dáil, we now know the Taoiseach knew that Deputy Cowen had made an incomplete statement to the Dáil. We will therefore have to ask the Tánaiste and the leader of the Green Party, the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, whether they also knew that the statement made was incomplete. I will pursue that matter with them since the Taoiseach will not answer.
I raise the issue of the failure to include workers in the North, by which I mean Antrim, Armagh, Derry, Down, Fermanagh and Tyrone, from the Covid-19 pandemic unemployment payment. This matter was raised repeatedly by many Deputies on the last Government's watch. Every time it was raised, the former Minister hid behind EU regulations. I fear that the new Minister will take the same tack. The position of the former Government was that EU rules relating to cross-Border workers determine that the member state of the resident is competent for the payment of unemployment benefits. Of course, this is not the case. In response to questions put to the Commission by my colleague, Chris MacManus MEP, it has been confirmed that EU regulations do not provide for a harmonised social security system in the EU. It was also confirmed that, under EU regulations, workers living in the North should have access to the same social and tax advantages granted by the member state in which they work as are granted to workers resident in the South.
Is the Taoiseach concerned about this matter? Did he or will he raise this matter with the European Commission? Does it not concern the Taoiseach that, contrary to EU regulations, residents of the North who work in the South have been significantly disadvantaged financially by not receiving the €350 pandemic payment to which they are entitled? Will the Government now reverse this decision and ensure that these workers receive the full unemployment payment to which they are and have been entitled? Will his shared island unit tackle the deeply embedded partitionist approach to public administration evident in the previous Government? I hope this approach will be rooted out within this Government.
Does Deputy Boyd Barrett wish to speak?
Yes, I want to-----
The Deputy should not take too long. We only have six minutes left.
I thank the Acting Chairman. I challenge what the Taoiseach said earlier about the Apple tax ruling. The ruling clearly states that the tax rulings made by Revenue were ineffective and inconsistent. The court does not contest that the level of tax on chargeable profits was totally out of line with the amount of tax that would be paid anywhere else under normal market conditions. In other words, the court accepted that Apple was involved in aggressive tax avoidance here. It only said that it could not quite prove that the inconsistent, ineffective and incredibly low tax rate Apple enjoyed through tax avoidance strategies represented an advantage deliberately conferred on that company, because that is a difficult thing to prove. The point is that we were being used as a tax haven and that Revenue's rulings were inconsistent and ineffective. Unless we think Revenue is stupid, which I do not believe it is, it is clear that we were colluding with these tax avoidance strategies. It is shameful that we did so because it means we have put the interests of a super-wealthy corporation ahead of the interests of the ordinary people who could badly do with that €13 billion in cash.
Deputy Nash's question was first. During my conversation with the British Prime Minister, on Brexit he said and we both agreed that it was in the best interests of the United Kingdom, Ireland and Europe that a comprehensive trade deal be agreed. We also agreed that we needed to get moving and introduce momentum to the talks. In my earlier conversation with Michel Barnier, there was a sense that momentum had not yet been injected into the talks and that it was necessary to make more rapid progress than has been made thus far. The British Prime Minister was very much taken with the idea of getting a deal done that would be comprehensive, good for the future relationship between the UK and Europe and that would be tariff free and quota free. I made the point that it would have to be subject to access to the Single Market and a level playing pitch. That was the nature of the discussion. It remains to be seen what will happen. The talks are still slow enough. There has been some progress with regard to the Northern Ireland protocol. More progress is needed on the other key issues that have held up talks to date.
With regard to my conversations with Angela Merkel and the size of the overall package, the Chancellor was very anxious that a deal be done at this meeting of the Council.
I said we supported the overall size of the package, that we felt that Europe needed to make a significant response given the crisis we are in and that that was important for confidence across Europe. We export to countries all over Europe and it is important that there is a strong eurozone and European recovery because that would benefit Ireland.
I think there is a 50:50 chance of success. It is not going to be easy. Some countries are very much against the size of the package. Some are against the nature of what has been proposed but progress has been made and the most recent negotiating box put forward by Charles Michel is reflective of some of our concerns, in particular the Brexit compensatory fund but also the idea of changing the allocation key in respect of the 70% to 30% split so that now 30% will be used later to deal with the impact of Covid. It will take some time.
In response to Deputy Barry's question, no I did not raise the Apple judgment with the President of the Commission, nor did he raise it with me. Obviously, that was a matter for the courts. The court has ruled and we either have regard for the rule of law and the courts or we do not. I heard Deputy Boyd Barrett's remarks as well. It is as if the court did not rule at all. The court annulled the decision of the Commission and essentially stated that Ireland did not collect any tax to which it was not entitled, nor could we collect tax to which we are not legally entitled.
I also make the point that 6,000 people work in Apple now. That matters. They are ordinary people. They never get mentioned. The relationship between Ireland and Apple from 1980 onwards has been a strong one. Ireland has to live in the real world. Approximately 245,000 jobs in this country have been created by multinational companies. That is not insignificant. Those are ordinary people working in those companies. We have had to compete for those industries.
I do take the overall point, as I stated in response to Deputy Nash earlier, in respect of the global framework and the necessity to work with the BEPS process and to get a fairer system globally in respect of the revenue of multinational corporations. However, we have to be sensible as a country too in the sense that we have to retain jobs here. These are subjects that rarely get discussed in this House. The debate is always in one direction. That is the basic argument I make to Deputy Barry and to Deputy Boyd Barrett. The other side of the story never gets discussed. Ireland is a much different country now than it was 30, 40 or 50 years ago. We are very good at manufacturing – high level and high-end manufacturing. We are very good at technology and software. We have a good indigenous sector. We have an emerging entrepreneurial sector. I put a significant amount of that down to the fact that there has been a significant spin-off from the presence of multinationals here, more than just money, funding and corporation tax. Many of our companies have grown on the back of that and are now themselves major companies as a result.
It very often depends on whether one believes in an enterprise economy or not. I believe we do need to change. We need to increase the level of focus on indigenous companies and try to grow them and help them more but, equally, we must be conscious that we are in a mobile, global world where other countries are competing. We have to keep our eyes open in that regard and not be naive about it either. I agree with what Deputy Nash said earlier, that there are other issues such as skills, education and research that can help to attract people in and embed them here as well.
I do not accept the assertions made. The Deputies are now changing the goalposts in terms of what the court did or did not do. The court was asked to assess whether illegal state aid had been provided in a deal done by Ireland with Apple and the court has annulled the conclusion that the Commission came to some time ago. In essence, that is what has happened. It is open to the Commission to appeal that. I think it has up to two years to appeal the decision and the funding will stay in the escrow account.
In response to Deputy McDonald's questions on the pandemic unemployment payment, I will pursue the issue with the Minister concerned. Things are never as simple as they are presented in terms of issues of this kind. To be fair to the outgoing Government, the pandemic unemployment payment, with which party leaders in the Opposition all agreed, was an important intervention to protect livelihoods. It does involve significant resources, as did the wage subsidy scheme. It got refined over time as anomalies emerged in the application of both schemes. I will have the matter examined.