IRELAND | The end of the royalty schemes

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Ireland pledged to crack down on multinational companies who use addresses in the republic  to avoid paying tax in their home countries . The new rules will come into force from January 2015.

Ireland’s finance minister, Michael Noonan, has promised a new finance bill that will include a measure to ensure that no Irish registered company can be stateless for tax purposes. “Let me be crystal clear. Ireland wants to be part of the solution to this global tax challenge, not part of the problem,” Noonan said.

The Irish government has come under repeated fire this year from tax campaigners to tie up loopholes that some claim have turned Ireland into a tax haven for transnational corporations such as Apple and Facebook.

The new rules to stop stateless companies will come into force from January 2015. They will be seen as a sop in particular to EU states such as Germany as Ireland seeks to defend its low corporation tax rate of 12.5%.