USING APPLE TAX IS ‘RUBBISH’ TALK
IRELAND can not use the €14billion in disputed tax it collected from Apple to help people affected by Covid19, the Taoiseach has said. On Sunday, Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald said the State could ‘right this minute’ use the account where the funds are being held to help the Irish economy. In 2016, it was ruled by the European Commission that the Irish State had given undue tax benefits worth €13billion to Apple, which is illegal under EU State-aid rules, and said it allowed Apple to pay substantially less tax than other businesses. Ireland was ordered to recover the illegal aid, plus interest, however the State and Apple are appealing the ruling. Yesterday, Leo Varadkar dismissed
Ms McDonald’s suggestion as ‘rubbish’. ‘Mary Lou McDonald should know better, the Apple money is in an escrow account and that is where it is being held until the European Commission decides where that money is going to go.
‘The European courts will decide whether that money either belongs to Apple or comes to the Irish Revenue Commissioners, and then has to be distributed out among the countries of Europe. It’s not ours to take and it’s now before the courts.
‘She should know better before coming out with that kind of rubbish.’
Mr Varadkar said a significant financial package will be announced this week for those who have lost their jobs due to Covid-19 and others who are at risk of becoming unemployed.
Responding to Mr Varadkar, Ms McDonald said: ‘I would say to the Taoiseach, we need an income support scheme. I am not interested in having a squabble with him as to where the monies are raised.
‘It is going to be an expensive scheme and it is going to be necessary.
‘It is going to be the wisest money we will invest in our workforce and in our economy at this time of emergency.
‘I want the Government to go further. It is unacceptable to leave tens of thousands of workers in conditions that are not safe, where they know they risk transmitting and contracting this virus and bringing it home to their families and children.
‘Rather than the Taoiseach telling us where the money won’t come from, he needs to apply himself to secure the funding, because this scheme has to happen.’