I move:
(1) That in relation to accounting periods ending on or after the 1st day of April, 1966—
(a) corporation profits tax under Part V of the Finance Act, 1920, shall be increased as follows:
(i) charge of an amount equal to twenty-three per cent of the profits shall be substituted for charge of an amount equal to fifteen per cent thereof;
(ii) as respects the first two thousand, five hundred pounds of profits, instead of there being a charge thereon of an amount equal to five per cent thereof, there shall be a charge thereon of an amount equal to seven and one-half per cent thereof;
(b) paragraph (b) of the proviso to section 52 (1) of the Finance Act, 1920, as amended by section 37 (1) (iii) of the Finance Act, 1963 (No. 23 of 1963), shall be further amended by the substitution of "thirty per cent" for "twenty per cent".
(2) That special provision may be made by the Act giving effect to this Resolution as respects accounting periods which began before and ended on or after the 1st day of April, 1966, for the purposes of the preceding paragraph.
The House will remember that, when I introduced the Budget on 9th March, I was not then in a position to indicate what the rate of British corporation tax would be. I said then that it would be necessary, as soon as that had been ascertained, to move a Resolution in connection with the Finance Bill. That has since been ascertained and, in order to increase the corporation profits tax on Irish companies, which should be relieved in another way, it is necessary to move this Financial Resolution.