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THE DEPARTMENT OF Finance has released its ‘White Paper’ ahead of the upcoming Budget, which confirms the Government will have a surplus of €25 billion for this year.
The ‘White Paper’ is published every year ahead of the budget and provides estimates of Ireland’s receipts and expenditure for the coming year.
The figures presented for 2024 are projections based on current information and are subject to revision when end-year figures become available.
The Department also notes that all figures are on a “technical pre-Budget basis and do not include any new policy measures to be announced as part of the 2025 Estimates and Budgetary processes”.
As well as a forecasted surplus of €25 billion for this current year, the Department is also forecasting a surplus of close to €12 billion for 2025.
However, this year’s figure includes all of the €14 billion windfall fund from Apple’s unpaid tax.
The European Court of Justice recently ruled that Apple must pay €13 billion to Ireland in unpaid taxes, something the Irish government had argued against.
While the 2024 figure includes all of the Apple tax for accounting purposes, only €8 billion of the Apple escrow fund will be injected into the exchequer this year, while the remaining €6 billion will be accrued next year.
And though the Apple tax makes up a great portion of the surplus, a record high of €30 billion in corporation taxes to be received by the State this year – €5.5 billion more than expected.
Yesterday, the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council warned that it “would be dangerous” to “pump” corporate tax receipts into the economy.
The Council is the State’s budgetary watchdog and was established to offer an “honest and independent view of how the Government manages its budget”.
It noted that a massive surplus was to be expected due to a spike in corporation tax due to the Apple tax ruling.
However, the Council cautioned that these “receipts would be once-off in nature” and that the surplus will be “significantly smaller in 2025”.
“A large deficit would be likely if not for these and other exceptional corporation tax receipts being collected from a handful of foreign multinationals,” said the Council.
“Pumping these receipts into a strong economy would be dangerous,” it added.
The Council also called for improved transparency in the White Paper itself.
“We’ve long argued that it should show gross rather than net spending,” said the Council, “which is hugely unhelpful.”
It said that these “general government figures would give a wider picture”.
Last week, Finance Minister Jack Chambers acknowledged that Ireland’s “fiscal position remains heavily exposed to volatile ‘windfall’ corporate tax revenues paid by just a small number of highly profitable firms”.
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and the majority of them will not take wheelchair jobs, I know from trying to get one several times
Now the hard part, getting them to pick up wheelchair users!
A lot of these are going to be put up for sale shortly after. Free money
@Sickof thisshit: basically, that’s it …the trust of the article seems to be those whinging & bitching they weren’t quick enough on the keyboard…… ‘ early bird + worm’ comes to mind
@Sickof thisshit: Except you can’t sell them.
@Gerard Carey: exactly, they have to be held for 5 years in the case of private ownership, slightly longer for commercial
@Sickof thisshit: nope u can’t sell em.
@Sickof thisshit: no they will not be it’s simply not possible. Sorry to leave facts stand in your way.
Amazing how little understanding or support for the disability community shown by the posters on here.
Actually it is not when I think about it.
Usual Ableist comments from people with not an ounce of empathy!
The question Peadar and the minister for transport minister need to be asking is how are 6 people at present advertising on donedeal that they have (4)251 WAV taxis soon to be here for €375 per week. How did these manage to get numerous grants in others names and then fleece lads who want to be taxi drivers….
Existing taxi drivers with plates are now cashing in on the ridiculous situation created by idiots in NTA and DOT.
They have started to rent their plates out for €6000 per year on donedeal(check if don’t believe me) and are then applying for new WAV license for €175 and this means even more people applying for the WAV grant.
The 6k per year pays for the new car minus grant over 5/6 years
The NTA should abolish the 10 year rule as this is a big strain on drivers to scrap perfectly good cars and have to spend 40k plus replacing them.
@Dave G Doe: I would if I needed a taxi and it was clean. Seen taxis imabroad nearly 20 yo in mint condition
I think you will find very little Irish will get the new licence, that’s why the portal closed after 15 minutes
@pauley870: all the Muhammad’s will have cleaned them up
What about the other vehicle owners they don’t get handouts they have to pay vrt & yat a bit of a joke
@Thomas Brophy: Other taxi drivers?
Grant is open to all taxi drivers. The older drivers are the lucky ones who can avail of the €25k grant for a new electric vehicle. Put a brand new Tesla on the road for €25k after grant and spend €6 a night charging rather than dragging a dirty diesel around and spending €30 a day.
Greed
have your say