Make Ireland ethical, equal and beautiful; and put economics in its proper place

EDITORIAL

Make Ireland ethical, equal

and beautiful; and put economics

in its proper place

argrethe Vestager, the European

Union’s competition commis

sioner, serves as an inspiration for

the main character in 'Borgen', a

Danish prime minister who tries to

juggle family life. She will know how economic

concerns do not drive all agendas, that quality

of life is more important than GDP. Apparently

she also like to knit elephants in her spare time,

because, she says, “they bear no grudge, but

they remember well”.

The tech world won’t soon forget August 30th

2016: that is when Ms Vestager ordered the

Irish government to recover up to €13bn, plus

interest of up to another €6bn, in unpaid taxes

from Apple.

The decision was expected, vested interests

had cynically played down the ﬁgure and the

purposes for which the back taxes – and they

are rightfully due, not some windfall – can be

put. The Commission concluded that Irish rul-

ings in 1991 and 2007 artiﬁcially lowered the tax

Apple was due to pay, and that although the

ﬁrm did not break any law, this arrangement

was in breach of EU state-aid rules preventing

member states from offering preferential treat-

ment to particular ﬁrms.

The spat centres on two Irish-registered sub-

sidiaries that hold rights to use Apple’s

intellectual property to make and sell its prod-

ucts outside the Americas.

The commission argues that a dubious proﬁt-

allocation deal allowed most of their proﬁts to

be moved to a “head ofﬁce” that existed only

on paper and was tax-resident in no country —

allowing Apple to shrink its tax rate in Europe

to well below 1%.

The ruling is the most important—and contro-

versial—moment so far in the war on corporate

tax avoidance. It is one that has liquidised the

moral armature of Ireland’s laissez-faire Fine

Gael party. Michael Noonan would rather

“defend the integrity of our tax system” than

accept a windfall that could transform the coun-

try. Something about seeds.

It is all part of an impoverished lack of vision.

Enda Kenny’s principal vision is to make Ire-

land the best little country in the world in which

to do business. Our leading politicians have

made it clear that the only “absolute red line”

in Ireland’s internationals affairs is retaining

Ireland’s Corporation Tax Rate of 12.5%.

New thinking is required. Ireland is an imagi-

native, youthful and dynamic country. It has

nothing to fear from pursuing ethical impera-

tives and imaginative politics. We do not need

to be the slave of the tax-evasive multinational

sector.

€19bn could change the country, belea-

guered after nearly a decade of austerity. It

would take a chunk off the national debt, which

now stands at €200bn. It could pay for a few

years of the Universal Social Charge, which

brings in around €4bn a year annually, or the

school building programme between 2016 and

2021 currently capitalised at €2.8bn. It would

pay for the health system for a year, or perhaps

enable a shift to a free National Health System.

It could rebalance a society where at the

moment the top 1% owns 15% of wealth. There

could be no stronger message that Ireland

intends to pursue a mature and equitable poli-

tics than that it recognises that one of the major

beneﬁciaries of globalism, should pay its debts

to the people on whom it depends, and in par-

ticular to the beleaguered populus that in

important ways has been hung out to dry by

global capital.

It could be used to address some big goals.

To reduce inequality, improve the quality of life,

plan a green and efﬁcacious new Ireland with

sustainable employment for all and high-qual-

ity well-planned housing, revitalising and

rebeautifying all the cities and towns of the

country.

The money should be used to address social,

environmental, cultural and governance issues.

To make us the best country in the world to live

in.

We owe nothing to the transient multinational

sector. It should pay corporate at taxes at a full

and reasonable rate.

Ministerial deference to multinationals

cannot be justiﬁed by any scientiﬁc assessment

of the consequences of alternative actions. As

with burning bondholders, taking our just

deserts from Apple would lose us no signiﬁcant

friends but gain us some pride and even

respect.

Observers would see that expecting justice

from our past dealings bespeaks a country that

can be relied upon, a mature partner and not a

deferential slave to the ungrateful global ﬁnan-

cial system

The judgment is the EU operating at its best.

We should grasp it, and sideline any dinosaur

who seeks to appeal it.

We should take Apple for every dollar it owes

us. It will stay in Ireland for the quality of our

workforce anyway. Then let’s look to forge a

great little country, not a deferential little econ-

omy; and move to pursue serious policies in

ﬁelds other than economics. We may even even-

tually start to grow comfortable with the

enhanced political and ethical standing that

doing the right thing would afford us.

Shove your best little country for business obsession

4 September 2016

EDITORIAL

  

NEWS

  

  

 Ken Foxe

  

 Frank Connolly

  

 Frank Connolly

12 COVER STORY 



 Michael Smith

  

 Michael Smith

  

 Anton McCabe

  

 Constantin

Gurdgiev

  

Eoin O’Malley

POLITICS

  

 Ronnie Fay

  



review by Niall Crowley

   George Monbiot

  

 Sarah Lennon

  



Niall Crowley

OPINION

  

 Conor Lenihan

IDEOLOGY DEBATE

  

 Desmond Fennell

  



Michael Smith

  





 John Waters

MEDIA

  



Gerard Cunningham

CULTURE

   Frank Armstrong

  

 Ed Carroll

  

review by Cormac Deane

  

NJMcGarrigle

  



 Trevor White

ENVIRONMENT

  



Emma Gilleece

  



 Emma Gilleece

  

 review by John Gibbons

  

interview by John Gibbons

INTERNATIONAL

  

 Anthony Coughlan

  



 Ken Phelan

  

Brendan Lynch

79 Village



  

CONTENTS









