Government to set out ‘general’ spending plan for Apple tax billions

By Gráinne Ní Aodha, PA

Minister for Finance Jack Chambers has said a “general direction” for the spending of billions of euro in taxes from Apple will be set out in the autumn.

He said it would take a number of weeks to assess the estimated €14 billion of funds, but emphasised again that it would not be used for day-to-day spending.

The Fianna Fáil TD said a decision may not be made by Budget Day on October 1st, but it would be “shortly after it”.

“So we’ll be setting out the principles of how we strategically manage that final determined allocation, whatever it might be.

“It’s going to take a number of months to get a final determination of what the allocation will be but I think we’ve been clear on it not being used for day-to-day spending.

“I think this Government should set the wider direction on how we feel it should be used to benefit the long-term productive capacity of the economy, and make sure we address other deficits that we see in terms of the infrastructure and other areas of the economy, and we’ll be assessing that over the next number of weeks and setting out a general direction.

“It may not be on Budget Day, but it will certainly be in the period shortly after it.”

He criticised a proposal from Sinn Féin on how to spend the funds when they were derived from an economic policy the party “criticise every day”.

Sinn Féin suggested on Monday spending €1 billion on projects in disadvantaged areas.

“We’re very clear as a party on supporting disadvantaged communities,” he said at the Fianna Fáil event in Killiney.

“Some of the measures that have been taken by Minister [for Education Norma] Foley, for example, in terms of DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity In Schools) and other areas in education have all been focused on disadvantaged communities.

“What we’ve done in sport and community infrastructure has all been about supporting opportunity in communities right across our country.

“Sinn Féin are just pontificating about how they’ll spend the proceeds of an industrial and enterprise policy that they criticise every day.

“They criticise our economy, they criticise the enterprise policy that has delivered surpluses and that delivers the possibility of further investment in communities.

“That’s why, when it comes to macroeconomic policy, whenever the next election is called, I think people want to see continued investment and also building a better state, where Sinn Féin will be more focused on criticising the State, and for some of them, they want to break our state in many instances.”