Corporate tax receipts outperform by €508m

The focus remained yesterday on corporate tax as the exchequer returns showed company tax revenues continuing to run ahead of profile.

After a week of controversy involving the EU ruling that Ireland must raise a €13bn demand in back taxes from Apple, the tax and spend figures for the first eight months of the year showed the exchequer had taken in €449m more than it had anticipated at the end of August, mainly due to the powerful performance of corporate taxes earlier this year.

In the month, corporate tax receipts brought in only €26m more than was anticipated, but the cumulative figure from company revenues — one of the ‘big four’ tax heads — has reached almost €3.5bn already this year.