Colm Browne, the newly-elected president of the Irish Tax Institute, has called for further measures in Budget 2023 to support businesses on repayment of warehoused tax debt.
Addressing the Institute’s AGM, Browne said that Revenue must adopt a pragmatic approach towards businesses as they begin to repay their warehoused taxes from 1 January 2023.
Browne said: “Many small domestic companies are under significant strain. Many are grappling with spiralling input costs, shortage of staff, and some continue to have supply chain difficulties.
“Over the coming months, there will be intensive Revenue engagement with taxpayers and it’s essential that we can get proper, realistic phased payment arrangements in place that take into account not just pandemic impacts but also the difficulties many SMEs face in the very challenging economic environment.
“The forthcoming budget must include some measures to support these businesses, but Revenue must also show understanding.”
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Referring to warnings about Ireland’s over-reliance on the multinational sector for income tax and corporate tax receipts, Browne said that the most sustainable strategy for reducing this concentration risk is to broaden the economic base by building an innovative, productive, and competitive indigenous sector.
“Effective tax measures have a significant role to play in this endeavour. And the fact is, notwithstanding some changes in recent years, existing measures like the EIIS, KEEP and the R&D Tax Credit are far from optimal.”
The Institute has made submissions to government on how these measures could be reformed to make them more accessible to SMEs, and hopes they will be reflected in Budget 2023 measures.
“While FDI will always play a central role in our economic model, nurturing a strong, innovative, clean, and green, indigenous SME sector will be crucial to the resilience of our economy. I hope the Commission on Taxation’s Report will contain some recommendations on tax measures that could assist in building that resilience into the future,” he added.
Browne is a tax director with PwC where he trained as an accountant and tax adviser, moving back home to the mid-west to work with BDO and later OBI, a firm in Limerick where he was a tax partner.
In 2018, he returned to PwC as tax director in their Limerick office. He was elected to the council of the Institute in 2014 and is its 47th president.
