IRELAND’S SOCIALIST MEP Paul Murphy surprised European politicians earlier today by ripping up his local property tax form during a speech in parliament.
Murphy was speaking about the practice of large companies like Apple and Google” using Ireland as a tax haven”, being incorporated here but registered for tax in Bermuda.
He asked how the parliament could talk about tackling aggressive tax planning and tax avoidance when Ireland itself functions as a tax haven.
“What makes it even more galling is that at the same time as facilitating the tax avoidance of the major corporations of the world, the Irish government is engaged in a campaign of threatening to rob the property tax from working people,” the Socialist Party MEP told the parliament.
“This is my return for the bailout tax, I won’t be registering together with hundreds of thousands of other people who will be saying ‘let the rich pay their taxes, working people have paid enough’,” he added, tearing up the form.
(Thejournalvideo/YouTube)
Afterwards the MEP tweeted a picture of the torn up form:
In an interview with Karen Coleman from radioep.ie after his parliament address, Murphy said he did it as a protest against the “complete lack of tax justice” in Ireland.
He also said both parties in government had campaigned over the course of the election against the tax which is “in reality a bailout tax to pay the bankers, the bondholders etc.”
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