Yes vote on Nice will force big businesses out of Ireland
1 over 70 Irish firms already do business in Latvia, an EU applicant state. This fact highlights that the Treaty of Nice will not increase markets for Irish firms. Due to the GATT (Global Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) Eastern Europe is already fully open to us.
2 Countries such as Latvia "will present challenges in terms of competitiveness". They will to Irish businesses because many of the eastern European countries strongly resemble Ireland in the '80s, with a cheap, flexible, well-educated work-force. Some have an unemployment rate of 16% and their average workers are paid a quarter of their Irish equivalent. How long do you think it will take the US computer multinationals to make a beeline for eastern Europe after rejecting the more expensive labour in Ireland?
3 Mr O'Sullivan stated that "there are still a lot of countries within the EU which are envious of our corporate tax environment". Certainly true. Many of the top figures in the EU such as Prodi, Schroeder, Jospin, Chirac, Solbes have already called for tax harmonisation, that is, making the taxes in Ireland higher. Gerhard Schroeder, German Chancellor said [we need], "the Europeanisation of everything to do with economic and financial policy" (The Times, 22 February 2002).
Pascal Lamy, EU Trade Commissioner, said "a natural first step would be to harmonise the tax bases and to adopt minimum tax rates but the ultimate goal should be the creation of a European Corporate income tax whose proceeds would either finance the EU or be allocated to Member States".
The ratification of the Treaty of Nice would scrap our right of veto in over 30 policy areas of vital national interest.
We will lose negotiating strength. If we lose negotiating power, by diplomatic horse-trading we could well be forced to increase our corporation tax. And the gateway to a two-tier Europe is also a gateway to tax harmonisation for the first group, including Ireland.
Increase of Irish corporation tax could lead to the flight of capital from Ireland.
I can see only economic loss following from ratification of the treaty of Nice. This is not beneficial for our country.
Hermann Kelly,
Ravenscar, Corrig Avenue,
Dun Laoghaire,
Co Dublin
