The Minister for Finance has responded to a parliamentary question from Deputy Michael McGrath TD on Corporation Tax paid by multinationals. Deputy McGrath is a Chartered Accountant. In 2013, the top ten multinational taxpayers paid a total of €1,561M, or almost 37% of all Corporation Tax paid. Chartered Accountants Ireland has already highlighted the consequences for existing tax yields if changes prompted by the OECD Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project result in a migration by multinationals away from this country.

In his 2011 Report, the Comptroller and Auditor General flagged that the Corporation Tax yield is reliant on relatively few companies – “in 2011, while some 36,000 taxpayers paid Corporation Tax, just 129 taxpayers accounted for almost two thirds of total tax receipts.” The 2013 Tax Strategy Group paper also noted that “over the last decade US companies have consistently paid around one third of the annual corporation tax revenue collected in Ireland.”

The overall contribution made by companies to the Irish Exchequer is in line OECD norms. At 2.5% of GDP, it is slightly behind the OECD average of 3% of GDP, but ahead of several other countries. In the US for example, the CT contribution is 2.3% of GDP. While much of the focus of the debate on BEPS has had to do with our capacity to attract FDI, an equally serious issue is our capacity to retain the tax revenues we already have.