The Government and Big Tech firms including Meta, Microsoft and Google are escalating efforts to oppose proposed EU tariffs on technology firms, which Paschal Donohoe warned would have “an extremely harmful effect” on Ireland, according to the Business Post.
The Minister for Finance warned that any move by Brussels to impose new taxes on tech risks scuppering the ultimate goal of agreeing a US trade deal.
“We would argue that we should find alternative ways of doing it. The Irish stance for some time is that we believe that digital services taxes would have an extremely harmful effect, not only on our own economy, but on the ability to reach an agreement on the future of trade between the EU and US,” Mr Donohoe told the Business Post in Warsaw.
Microsoft and Facebook owner Meta are understood to be particularly engaged at a high level and meetings have also taken place in recent weeks with Amazon, LinkedIn, Stripe and Dell.
Corporation tax receipts grew by 18 per cent last year to €28 billion, according to the latest exchequer returns. There is significant concern that those revenues could be jeopardised if tech is dragged into the trade war.
Plan to unlock raft of offshore wind project sites
Renewable energy giants will be able to bid on a raft of big offshore wind project sites in one go under dramatic new plans being proposed by Darragh O’Brien to kick-start the stuttering multibillion-euro industry in Ireland, the Sunday Business Post reports.
The Minister for the Environment will this week look to overhaul the state’s offshore wind processes to unlock a swathe of development sites all around Ireland’s coasts at the same time, as he races to save the state’s chances of delivering on its 2030 sectoral targets, regarded as crucial for underpinning investor confidence in the sector.
Companies including EDF Renewables; RWE, the German multinational energy firm; and Statkraft, Europe’s largest renewable energy generator, are all currently developing sites in Ireland and could be among the bidders for contracts under O’Brien’s turbocharged approach.
Farmers race to get land de-zoned
Local authorities in key commuter belt counties are being hit with a flurry of requests from landowners seeking the rezoning of their land to an agricultural zoning from residential, according to the Sunday Independent.
The requests come ahead of a looming deadline in May for landowners of residential zoned land to pay a new tax designed to incentivise house building.
Tax cuts not off the table in budget if tariff war ‘de-escalates’
Tax cuts in the budget won’t be firmly off the table if the tariff war between the US and EU “de-escalates,” Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe has said, the Sunday Independent reports.
Asked about how tariffs might hit pledges to reduce the Universal Social Charge and other taxes, Mr Donohoe said: “If our economy is healthy, if we have avoided the trade shock, we can put in place policies that continue to support workers, continue to ensure that we can help with affordable changes on taxation.
