Mairead McGuinness move to finance reminds Ireland about a changing EU tax reality
THERE is one last hurdle left, and seven days to go, before Mairead McGuinness is fully confirmed as Irish Commissioner by an EU leaders’ summit on October 15.
The Irish chair in the policy-guiding European Commission in Brussels will by then have been empty for a total of 51 days, in the time of a rolling Brexit crisis, since Phil Hogan’s exit on August 26.
The former Irish Independent journalist, an MEP since 2004, had delivered a big performance at a ratification hearing before her former parliament colleagues last Friday. Yesterday the full European Parliament duly voted for her, and one other change to the commission, by a huge vote of 583 votes in favour and 75 against.
MEPs also approved commission vice president Valdis Dombrovskis adding trade to his economy portfolio. The former Latvian prime minister follows in the footsteps of the former Irish commissioner Phil Hogan, who was rated a Brussels heavy-hitter and the trade position is ranked among the most powerful in the EU capital.
Mr Hogan resigned after a week of controversy surrounding his attendance at a golf match and dinner in Clifden, Co Galway, organised by politicians of all parties. The former Fine Gael environment minister and director of elections insisted he broke no laws surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic.
But in an unprecedented move, the Government told his boss, commission president Ursula von der Leyen, they no longer had confidence in him.
Ms von der Leyen later got her way in having an Irish woman nominee – instead of the Government favourite, Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney. It brought her closer to her stated goal of a gender-balanced team as there are now 13 women, including herself, and 14 men.
Ms McGuinness, as a firsttime nominee, could not hold the trade portfolio. But she did get an influential job in charge of financial services and stability as well as the creation of the EU Capital Markets Union. The heft of her portfolio should help Ireland’s lobby effort surrounding Brexit – but EU tax plans will be a different story.
Her portfolio does not include taxation but that did not prevent a plethora of questions on the issue of “tax dumping” and Ireland’s policies in relation to multinationals’ company taxation.
Ms McGuinness pledged to leave her “national hat at the door” and fully support all EU taxation initiatives – including those which are anathema to Ireland and which she frequently opposed as an MEP.
The commissioner-designate said she believed the “digital giants” – we know she meant
Google, Facebook, and the rest – should “pay their fair share of taxes”. She also supported the controversial Financial Transaction Tax and tax transparency on a country by country basis.
Spanish Socialist MEP Jonas Fernandez said he was happy with these answers. “We are convinced that she will act as a European commissioner and that she is committed to the interests of the EU as a whole,” he said.
The portfolio she takes up is stuffed with dense topics, and a dizzying array of acronyms. Many of the ambitious plans she is charged with advancing are impeded by trenchant opposition from member governments.She herself has acknowledged that, as with so much else, Covid-19 has changed all the ground rules.
Central to the brief is progressing the Capital Markets Union, which is a key objective in completing Economic and Monetary Union.
The idea was launched in 2014 by commission president Jean-Claude Juncker.
The aim is to improve efficiency in capital markets by encouraging competition between banks and cutting loan rates.
It is also about diversifying sources of investment away from the banking sector and debt.