Hard choices on tax policy

THE letter from the Department of Finance (Irish Examiner, Sept. 17) misrepresents what I said in my earlier letter on how Ireland's company tax rates would fare under the Nice Treaty.

Nice abolishes the veto that Ireland currently has on the harmonisation of company taxes in the eurozone, a sub-group of EU states, and the use of the EU commission, council, court and parliament for the purposes of this sub-group. We still control our own national tax rates and can opt out if the other eurozone states move to harmonise company taxes, as they are very likely to do under Nice. Statements by leading EU figures indicating that that is their objective may be seen on our website at www.nationalplatform.org

But if we do not go along with the other eurozone members in such an eventuality, thereby undermining the principal incentive we have used to attract foreign capital to Ireland, we will be faced with becoming a second-class EU member with diminished influence outside the core eurozone group. Nice, if ratified, is likely to face us before long with this unpleasant choice.

Contrary to what the Department asserts, I did not say in my earlier letter that the other eurozone states could “coerce” Ireland into changing our rate of corporation tax.

However, the way the Taoiseach “rolled over” when he went to the Gothenburg EU summit after last year's referendum, to quote former Attorney General John Rogers, does not inspire confidence in our politicians' will to resist EU pressure.

Anthony Coughlan,

Secretary,

The National Platform,

24 Crawford Ave.,

Dublin 9.