 Good afternoon or good evening Radha. You're very welcome to our 2021 Young World Professional Network Christmas Special this evening where I'm delighted to be joined by a panel of experts and commentators who are going to get stuck into some of the key political developments that have occurred over the last 12 months. My name is Dara Moriarty and I chair our YPN and I work in communications at the OAA. In normal circumstances the Christmas YPN is essentially a second office party for us at the OAA staff, only the age of 35, only the age of 35 because we are primarily an ageist endeavor at the YPN would come along. They would wear our Christmas jumpers, they would have minced poise, they would eat pringles, they'd have a few bottles of beer, glasses of wine, there'd be soft drinks for the non-drinkers but unfortunately for the second year in a row we're doing things virtually. Now it's not going to be as much crack but we're going to do our best to have a bit of crack even though 2021 hasn't been a very fun filled year. Absolutely delighted this evening to be joined by Sean and Mori, Conor O'Neill and Aidan Regan. I'm going to formally introduce them in a moment but before I do so I just want to quickly run through some of the format issues and some of the housekeeping issues which I'm sure you're all very, very familiar with at this point. We're going to cover a range of topics. I have a couple of questions that I'm just going to put to each panelist. We will chop and change and jump around different topics just because the nature of the panel's review of the year. Please get your questions in. You can do so via the Q&A function on Zoom and you can of course join the discussion on Twitter as well using the handle at IEEA and the hashtag YPN. The full discussion is on the record and it's going to go up on our YouTube channel and our podcast platforms straight afterwards. And yeah, just please get stuck in and ask your questions and enjoy the discussion. Let me turn to our speakers who will formally introduce now. Sean and Mori is Europe correspondent with EuroNews. She's previously political correspondent with the Irish Independent and foreign affairs correspondent with News Talk. She is specialized in Brexit, has supported from dozens of countries around the world, such as Israel and Gaza, Iraq, Turkey, Syria border, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, Haiti and Guantanamo Bay. She holds an M field in international peace and an LLM in international law from the college. She's an alum of the U.S. State Department's Edward Orr Moro program for journalists. Conor O'Neill is head of policy and advocacy with Christian Ed Ireland and international aid and development NGO based in Dublin and Belfast. He leads the organization's work on climate change and economic justice, focusing on the issue of human rights, corporate accountability, tax avoidance and inequality between the global north and south. He previously worked as a researcher and advisor in the Iraqis in the EU institutions and with the human rights NGO based in Brussels. He has a BA and MSA in politics from Trinity College Dublin. And last is Aiden Regan, associate professor at the School of Politics and Science Relations at University College Dublin and a columnist with Business Post. He's director of UCD's Jamini Centre of Excellence in the new political economy of Europe and director of graduate master studies at the School of Politics. Aiden completed his PhD in Public Policy at the College of Social Science at UCD. We're also working at the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labor Studies at the University of Amsterdam. I'm really delighted this evening to be joined by your very distinguished panel. And we'll have to just jump straight in with questions and John will come to you first. You've just been telling us about how busy your day is with the European Council taking place tomorrow on Friday. And I do want to talk to you initially just about German politics and about the impact that, you know, Chancellor Merkel's tenure coming to an end is going to have on the EU. You know, you've covered the European Union for a very long time and you're very familiar with the impact she's had over 16 years in office. Olaf Scholz became the Chancellor on the 8th of December. How do you think his impact is going to be felt in the Council tomorrow? And what will a post-Mercal EU look like? I think the hope is that it'll be very similar with Olaf Scholz because Angela Merkel was really seemed to be quite a rock and steady the ship between, you know, from crisis to crisis that the EU has lurched from whether it's the banking debt crisis, the refugee crisis, COVID crisis. So I think everyone would like to believe that he will be able to do something similar and possibly better because there's a hope that the EU has learned from its mistakes when it comes to austerity. We saw that recognition with the EU Recovery Fund 750 billion euro last year. In particular, I think one of the things that is quite a negative part of Angela Merkel's legacy is the fact that she over the past 10, 12 years has appeased people like Victor Orban, the law and justice party in Poland, Janis Jansa in Slovenia by not engaging properly and coming hard on those countries when they've breached rule of law, not just the rule of law, your principles, your values to the point now we're hungry is no longer regarded as a democracy. And that obviously has implications for the rest of the European Union for all of us for EU taxpayers money because there's very reasonable charges of corruption against Victor Orban. So I think Angela Merkel's legacy is quite tarnished because of this because she's never. And she's never led the Commission really she's never influenced the Commission to take a hard line which could have done in terms of the treaties against these countries. So all of Schultz and is it is hoped will take a harder line but also because he's going to government with the Greens, who themselves have said that needs to be a stronger line in this regard to this hope. And from sort of a more leftist or center left perspective that he can steer the EU back to its values and principles and not be so. So I think Angela Merkel's was in hawk to maybe sort of, you know, big, big organizations or sort of the German car manufacturers and so on who have such huge business and hungry wouldn't want to see a confrontation between all those sides. So that's really the hope of all of Schultz. And I mean he's been obviously he's been around a long time he's an establishment figure, you know, vice chancellor and so on so he's been there from the start of Kobe. And I think in terms of the changes in terms of how COVID is dealt with and we've seen that the Germany is taking much harder line against the unvaccinated as well so I think the hope is that he may be an improvement but there's you have to have to admit there's nobody been really like Angela Merkel, not just because she's a woman, but when we had Trump in office and it looked like global security was under threat and it still is then Angela Merkel was a very important person to have. She wasn't threatened by Trump, in fact he was threatened by her, and I think everybody was glad to have around throughout that period. And then I also think you know her legacy around the refugee crisis historically will always be the right decision I think that was a landmark decision, and she should get huge amount of kudos and support for that. Thanks very much, Donna Aiden just picking up on some of the points that that's shown a raise there. Do you have any sense or anything to add on sort of maybe the economic impact that Chancellor Merkel has had on the European Union you know we think of the debt crisis we think of the financial crisis, any thoughts on that? Yeah I mean, I think Angela Merkel's legacy will be kind of viewed in different time periods. I think the, I don't think her approach to European fiscal and monetary policy, economic policy, 2009-10 in those kind of years will be viewed too favorably by historians, but at the same time, one has to acknowledge that at that point Angela Merkel was primarily responding to domestic public opinion, or a certain part of domestic German public opinion. So she was quite constrained by what you know the right of her own political party wanted she was constrained by kind of the emergence of a more kind of euro-steptic vote to kind of, and of course the AFD, Alternative for Deutsche Hand, emerged as that kind of anti-redistrictive, no physical transfer is no indeed. So she was constrained in that sense, but then later on of course she showed that she can kind of go against the kind of reactionary right within her country by her position on the refugee crisis, etc. I think progressives you know as Shona just said will look favorably upon those years and what she did there, but I think you know there is a legacy of damage to the European Union in terms of its implementation of what pretty much everybody agrees at this stage where there are certain policies that negatively affected economic growth, employment, cohesion, the list goes on, and we're still kind of living with the legacy of that picking up the pieces. That's not to say that Angela Merkel is anyway directly responsible for us, but the politics within the European Council, the politics within the Eurogroup, very much centered around Germany and the CDU. I think you know perhaps from a politics political stability perspective people might be wanting all of Schultz to kind of continue in that stable vein, but maybe the EU needs a bit of disruption on the economic side, maybe the EU needs a bit of disruption on the physical and monetary side, maybe it needs a bit more of a progressive so it will be interesting to see whether he builds a new coalition, you know with Macron or with Draghi or with Pedro Sanchez in France. It's interesting to see the new dynamics within the European Council because it's not the CDU anymore. And I think that is an important shift and I think it will have an impact on the trajectory of physical policy although having said that a lot depends on the finance ministry within Germany and that's held by somebody who's more to the right of Angela Merkel so who knows. It's interesting as well just that what Aidan says there like from the kind of development and human rights sector, I know there's a huge amount of focus and interest in what might change in terms of foreign policy, not just on the economic and financial side but for a very, very long time Germany and Merkel as Chancellor have had such a huge influence, often a deciding influence in the Council on big issues of foreign policy. We, for example, we've run programs in Israel and Palestine, going back to the 40s, and that on the Middle East peace process this is something that Germany has tended to take a really cautious and at times conservative line that blocked a lot of initiatives at EU level. And like like Shona said, on some issues on migration, for example, pushing one direction, but on other issues more recently around say vaccine justice, Germany again has been a big and vocal voice at EU level that's been really staunchly opposed to some of the measures that are opposed there so you know you're hoping as well with the fact that the Greens are part of the coalition that maybe the common German line on some of those big foreign policy issues might have a bit more wiggle room or might shift but we're going to have to see I suppose. On both those points, you know, I think with the austerity measures and, you know, Angela Merkel did push, push against her at the time during the Greek, specifically the Greek debt crisis part in 2015 when there was calls for Greece to be taken out of the EU by her finance minister at the time and she resisted that and I think has been acknowledgement about austerity which is why Germany led and the calls for the 750 billion euro rescue fund, which Germany wasn't going to get much of France obviously got a huge amount but it was obviously going to go to Italy and Spain on the human rights issue though I think you'll be disappointed Connor because I think Germany will never know German government in in the next 10 years will publicly confront Israel in relation to the Palestinian territories as much as they are, you know, even Heike Maas did move in some direction, a much more compassionate line. But I think that Germany isn't ready for that right now. Historically, and from a societal perspective I don't think they will maybe they'll move in towards giving more aid to the Palestinians. But I don't think that they will be caught defining an apartheid situation and he liked that. Yeah, I'm showing just to pick you up on a point to move off Germany then in a moment but you went as far as to say you know her legacy was tarnished by by her relationship with with with hungry on the rule of law issue. And, you know, how do you see that do you see do you see a different approach coming from Shultz and from the new German government or. Well that's the hope I mean that's that's what you when you when you asked the Germans and certainly the Greens because they were they're going quite hard on this and then remember the green MEPs in the parliament have been very strong like the Daniel on they've been leading the charge they're the ones who are pursuing the commission they're actually suing the commission for a dereliction of duty for not taking a hard line against Poland and hungry over various issues around rule of law. And I think that what's happened is, you know, over 1012 years I remember I remember being a summit where Andy Kenny was the T-shirt, and the EPP was obviously so influential at the time. And, you know, asking well look at the time I remember the door and he was starting these sort of reforms where he was criminalizing people for being homeless and so on. And I remember the indignance, you know, as a journalist like that Andy Kenny even responded to me with this and you know well Victor urban with no business interfering in in domestic affairs, which is sometimes the line that member states take and that's understandable to a certain point, but these are also the LGBT community and the and so on people who he's targeting in order to whip up fear these are EU citizens and they deserve protection or the treaties. And so this has continued because if Angela Merkel wanted to take a stronger line within the EPP when Orban was there. This, we wouldn't have maybe gotten to this point but she, she was constantly about an appeasement. And, you know, similarly we've had the watering down of the legislation which aligns rule of law Biden with the rule of law to getting Asian funding and structural funding and money from the recovery fund. In the last few months we have seen also the Commission taking a bit of a hard line and the party pushing for that so we'll see what happens over the next few months but it's not a sustainable situation when you look at the confrontation between Poland and the European Court of Justice and what's been happening and hunger it's, it's not good for any of us. Yeah I think if I can jump in and just make a comment on that. I think it is interesting I think something that's often not kind of remarked upon or maybe not more publicly acknowledged is just how integrated hungry Poland Czech Republic and various busy grad states are into German supply chains. I mean, Hungary is to foreign investment in Germany, what Ireland is to foreign investment in the United States of America. So there's a very close network of business relationships between key automobile manufacturers within Germany to have serious investments in Hungary. And you know even before the last kind of Hungarian election, the German Chamber of Commerce within Hungary was very clear that they were leaning towards a fetish government they that's what they kind of would have preferred, because the economic policies that fetish and Orban pursues domestically are very much in their interest I mean he has cut the corporate tax rate to the lows in the European Union. There are various labor market reforms, which are very much about investing in science technology and engineering and develop that vocation and training structure which is beneficial type of skills ultimately to those companies need. So, you know, though, a lot of the manufacturing of key global German companies today takes place in busy ground, and you know that obviously as you can imagine a lot of those business networks are also closely tied to the CDU and so on, particularly within Bavaria. And there's a lot of quiet politics behind the scenes in Germany and Hungary. To what extent that can continue as shown the same or it will be guessed the point where by some is this just can continue, we might be at that point. It may not be even in Germany is kind of the business interest to begin to be associated with this anymore. But you know, you know, I'm not so sure that a lot of corporate capitalism in Germany is all that bothered whether it's a liberal or liberal democracy to be honest, but it's very interesting that you have now in Chancellor that's in the S&D group, of course, you know, because, at least when you're in sort of a sort of a center right pro business, pro industry party, like the EPP, then it's sort of an expectation that you take that line that again is supportive of particularly the car industry. But in the S&Ds, Olaf Scholz has a responsibility to uphold the values of a grouping like that and talk about, you know, because we've seen ways you mentioned the labor reform, we've seen the situation in Hungary where people who are getting down were not really, they didn't really have good supports or a proper regulated labor market, we've seen protests there and that. So this is a real challenge for Olaf Scholz actually. And it is interesting to see the opposition getting organized in Hungary, I mean, the opposition only a couple of years ago was highly fragmented, but the new kind of coalition of the broad left seems to be getting its house in order, particularly in the key city. So that's perhaps domestically something to watch within Hungary because if any change is going to come there, it's going to come domestically. Yeah, exactly. And conscious that it was 20 minutes in on question one. So I'll move around. Conor, second question is to you, and it's on COP and, you know, obviously you mentioned some of the work that the drone organization is doing in this area. And your own research interest is on climate justice. I mean, everyone saw, I think hopefully everyone saw that the impassioned plea from former President Mary Robinson on the issue of climate justice at COP. And how would you assess sort of, you know, a couple of weeks on now from the outcome of COP26, how would you assess what the pledges that were made from a climate justice standpoint. Yeah, I mean, I think to be honest being in Glasgow for two weeks and talking to delegates and negotiators, particularly from global south countries. It was a very frustrating and at times kind of depressing experience because you see in real time, the needs and the views of poor communities kind of being sidelined by bigger, more powerful states and those calls echoed by the likes of Mary Robinson by our commissions by delegates themselves for, you know, fair and fast and ambitious but equitable climate action, and kind of being kicked the touch in terms of an assessment I mean I think as well. It's hard to judge something like this in term like as a binary success or failure. You know so I think you have to, you have to kind of be honest about what what COP is it is essentially an attempt to try and determine a global baseline. It's 200 countries who come together, and the entire process is done by consensus so anything that's agreed has to be agreed by everyone. So it kind of automatically if you look at the system. It tends towards a lowest common denominator outcome. That's the baseline this is the point that everybody from the most ambitious states to the most conservative to the ones with the highest emissions profile to the lowest, all agree on. And then you can you can consider then like is that baseline higher than it was before, and arguably yes, but at the same time is there still an enormous gap between that, and where you need to be. Definitely. And the crucial thing I suppose from from my view and the reason we were there is that kind of global climate justice perspective is what's being agreed and how is it how is it shared out and the, like what we see is a development organization is the just the sheer just how profoundly unequal climate changes. You know you see you look at for example the flooding in South Sudan at the moment, and the fact that many of the world's poorest communities who have a done least to cause the crisis, who B have the least resources to adapt and protect themselves are being disproportionately impact. And what's happening in South Sudan, in terms of flooding you see flooding drought cyclones and is occurring right across Africa. What I consider the flip side is that the entire continent of Africa is responsible for less than 4% of historic carbon emissions, or you can you can consider that geography but also the economics of it. And that's half of the world, you know around three and a half billion people is responsible for one 10th of historic carbon emissions, and that that sort of inequality is recognized in in the climate treaties, it's recognized in what was agreed and I think it has a nine in the Paris climate agreement 2015. And the, the targets that have been set for rich high emitters like Ireland to essentially you know get our emissions down quicker. So to leave as much of the remaining carbon budget for those poorer countries, but also crucially to provide them with financial support, which if you were watching the news coverage was the big hot ticket item for the whole two weeks. The targets haven't really been met. And a lot of the, the trickier thornier questions of who's going to pay what and how, how does the global north essentially repay its ecological debt to the people who are being disproportionately impacted. They were kicked to touch and I was talking to a delegate there, and he made the argument that you know imagine if you're, if you're a really wealthy neighbor and set your house on fire. And in the process of doing it, he got richer. And then when you asked him to try and fix it. He kind of said, Well, you know, I can maybe give you some advice or give you some of this change or maybe I can give you a loan at a really good interest rate. You just wouldn't accept it. And that that's, I think it was very hard to see that inequality playing out that the flip side I suppose the more positive part though I'd say is for the entire week. The delegates will be streaming into this venue in Glasgow. There was just reams and reams of people, primarily young people outside the venue, holding not just the negotiators to account but also the big well funded NGOs the researchers the journalists who were there. And this kind of global distribution aspect was first and foremost for all of them. So I think the limited progress is there and it's because of that sort of growing environment climate movement and I think, even though the, the bilateral system kind of kicks in and it protects the interest of bigger powerful states that demand for climate justice isn't going away and it'll be there in Egypt in 11 months time for COP 27 it'll be there the following year and yeah our job I suppose is to push for it to be to listen to you know. 100% Aiden on climate financing, you know, I mean it seems to be the new, the new issue that all the, all the big corporations are jumping on. You know, I mean I think there was a quote from Lawrence to be on and who said, greenwashing is the new climate denial. And what's what's your own take on that on that issue because we heard pledges of billions and the world was saying we need trillions. So, where do you see that going. Yeah, I mean, you know there's loads of ways different ways to describe this kind of green capital neoliberal neoliberal 2.0 type thing I mean the fundamental question here of course and you've alluded to it is who's going to finance the transition right and and that is the fundamental question here who's going to put the capital in. And this was in the sense is two ways to look at it either the state takes a very active role and has a coordinated fiscal monetary plan and allocates capital effectively to kind of big green renewable projects and leads to charge and basically issues public bonds to finance that transition and central banks themselves would have a very proactive role. That's a kind of green industrial policy. That's not really where we're at. Not withstanding kind of some voices in that space and vote on academia and policy really where we're at is kind of green capital and green finance and it was very clear a cup and Glasgow that that's where the train is moving. I think they have a very important speech said there was 130 trillion available in global assets under management by global investors and he's willing and they're willing to put up that 130 trillion to finance the transition and then very quickly people realize when you look under the numbers and what do global asset managers do well the allocate capital to what's most profitable, not to what's what's needed, and what's most profitable at the moment continues to be carbon intensive industry and carbon intensive and there's all most of that money that is said to be shift will be shifted into green energy is already bound up in carbon intensive project so why would some super rich asset manager suddenly turn around and tell his clients that well you're now going to get maybe a 1% return we don't know it's uncertain. So the kind of paradigm shift I think that we're seeing at the moment in green finances the hope is that the state will effectively the risk the investments they'll become the cover basically they'll give shows social insurance to private capital that they'll get good money out of this, and they'll go ahead and do it and make the money. I mean most depending on the on the on the studies you read but it's estimated that about 5 trillion is needed globally on an annual basis in an investment to reach even the humble targets at the lower end of those targets so I mean where's that 5 trillion going to come from. So I'm less convinced that green finance is going to lead the way primarily based on the evidence that to date. We know that these investors tend to pursue what's profitable, not what is necessary and as Connor said fundamentally, we're talking about a structural paradigm shift to reach that zero by 2050 and that requires a complete rethinking in our mindsets about how to allocate capital in the economy. One thing as well that sticks out and what Aiden just said there is like we've done a bunch of research in collaboration with program other organizations on, you know, the limited amounts of climate finance, especially public climate finance coming from the global north to south, where it's been spent what it goes on, and the reliance on private finance to try and top that up and meet the target has seen it flow in where we would see as the totally the wrong direction. So generally this money is kind of split between mitigation efforts so how do you get your emissions down to adaptation so how do you kind of protect yourself so building something like a seawall. And then finally in theory is being pushed for to actually compensation for losses and damages that are felt in countries that have had contributed very little to the crisis and overwhelmingly private finance goes to the first one, because you can generate a return on investment if you're a big hedge fund or whatever. And if you if you close down coal plants and you build a renewable renewable energy wind turbines and stuff like this. It is possible to generate an investment there. And then, but the latter two. It's very very hard to convince people and to invest their money in building a seawall in parts of Sub-Saharan Africa to present people from flooding. And then there's a lot of compensation measures that are really urgently needed. If you're going to address the fairness and just the side of it. It's just not going to happen you're not going to orientate so much private capital to what something that is just going to be less profitable and so many other alternatives. And that I watched that my county speech I was listening to it, and you could see the heads of the, the g77 and lowering countries delegates just shaking, just knowing that it was just part of this kind of Tory bluster. Yeah, just pulling figures out of the air, and lo and behold, when you do the sums. There's nothing really behind it. So I would hope that the of the two visions that Aiden talked about there at this, like the state is going to have to take a lead on this, not just to decarbonize Western European economies, but to, as I would see it repay the sort of ecological debt that we have to those countries that are feeling the impacts but have contributed comparatively so so little to historic CO2 emissions. Moving. Thanks very much lads for for insights and that I think it's really, really fascinating, and moving from climate justice to economic justice and corporate tax and global tax reform. Aiden yourself in last week's business post that encouraged anybody who's watching in or listening in to read the piece you wrote was really brilliant fascinating long reads trying to get the bottom of how Ireland's corporate tax rate has jumped from 6 billion in takings in 2015 to 14 billion in takings in 2021. And can you talk to us about this maybe give us a short version because the article is really, really extensive. And can you talk us through that and then just also reflect on the reforms that we're currently seeing through the OECD and how that might have any impact on these arrangements so Aiden over to you. Yeah, sure. Well, if you think the piece was the you should see should you should see the longer research pro project that it's part of you know, but the. Yeah, look, it's complicated. And of course, that's one of the reasons why we don't talk about tax because it is complicated so I think the role of social science here is to kind of make visibility invisible and to decipher a lot of this to make it accessible for the public interest. It's fairly clear that, you know, with the ending of the double Irish tax structure, the tax voicing which is a place for 20 odd years, whereby effectively, you know, somebody mostly US companies with intellectual property in the pharma or the tech sector could register a company in Ireland before tax purposes, it was in the Bermuda's or some other offshore and British jurisdiction. And of course, under US law, it was an Irish company, but in Irish law, it was the Bermuda company, and this effectively allowed, you know, companies to house their intellectual property in this Bermuda Irish structure and ultimately license the use of it then to say the Irish companies at Jubilee Ireland, who would pay a large fee to use whatever intellectual property is the algorithm the right to advertise, such that they could effectively bring down their taxable income to the very low levels and this structure, you know, was in place for a long time. But when that came, of course, global pressure European Union, also from the US began to put, you know, say that we can't continue with this system anymore. It's allowing global companies to reduce their effect of corporate tax rate to as low as 5% on foreign earnings and we're talking here keep in mind about trillion dollar companies, you know. And then the question always was, it's just the group pastel don't have power finance, put an end to this and 20 sorry, it was Michael Newton at the time in 2015. What's going to happen next, that was always the big question you put the structure to an end what's going to happen next and Ireland basically gave these companies five years to plan their next step or plan the next strategy. The question was, would these companies, you know, move their intellectual property to Singapore to Delaware, you know, keeping an over to Ireland or to the Netherlands, etc. And it has gone in different directions. Well clearly, if you look at the data look at the CSO data on a net capital stock, you look at some of the data that I use on company registrations. I mean, there is now according to the estimates and work I've done about the conservatively at a 400 billion intellectual property has been onshore to the island of Ireland. And at the same time, the corporate tax rate has just been going up and up and the correlation is very clear. So clearly there's a strong correlation between the ensuring of the intellectual property by the farm and tech companies, and the kind of boom and corporate tax receipts what's not so clear is the mechanism that ties all that together. And there's different views on this because on the one hand, you know, for example, alphabet Google, they haven't done it they've shifted their intellectual property to Delaware, right. So I think we're knowing that Delaware doesn't tax from income that comes from a capital. That's what so so Delaware has emerging as the global tax haven be like an interesting Delaware is the state that Joe Biden represented for 35 years. So, I mean, so, because they are booming in profits right and they've had to come up with some sort of cost sharing arrangement with their Irish subsidiaries so for example, Google paid 600 million in tax to the Irish state last year that's quite significant and the companies again it's not revealed because it's paying almost up to a billion right 900 million in some cases. So there's, if either the profits that are being declared in Ireland have simply gone up with the ensuring of this capital other sort of stuff going on but it's a very clear correlation. So the ending of the double Irish structure has led to this answering capital, but the core point I think here is, it's very volatile so it's gone from 6 billion to 40 billion and Ireland is reaping the rewards of this what I've called treasure Ireland in that article. Absolutely. But what will happen next we don't know because you know the scheme ultimately is shifting intellectual property here. We'll give you the incentive is you don't pay tax, or you can issue along to yourself to buy your own intellectual property house it here for a certain time, not the time, and we won't tax the income that emerges from it. Then that changed a bit, it's going to be 80% or 100% so it's quite complex. At some stage it may be the case that these companies just decide you know what it's not really in our interest to keep it in Ireland anymore, because what is intellectual property something it's not a factory it's not something that you know it's literally it could be somebody's hand-dried, it could be an email. It could be just simply a contract it's a contract effectively it's a legally constituted contract that says you have the license to use that so it's completely intangible. So you can flick a switch and send it over to Delaware, right. So I think that the volatility really is a problem for Ireland. Well, you know from a purely self-interested perspective and these companies are acting rationally, they're shifting profit, they're protecting their profits, you know they want to kind of reduce taxable income, and Ireland is kind of carving off a decent slice of that pie for itself. But, and this is your your the subsequent part of your question, other companies aren't happy about that. And that's why they, you know we have the speed with which Joe Biden pushed that to the top of the agenda in the OECD the speed to which we ended up with the 15% minimum global corporate tax rate which I think is a bit of a sideshow really because the next step is what matters. What are the taxing rights? Who's going to decide what's taxable? Where's the intellectual property? Where's the labor? Where's the sales? Because we're talking here about digital markets that don't have physical jurisdictions and this is the complexity today. So yeah, I mean once you know what's going to happen next, but I think this focus on the headline rate is just a bit of noise. It's really the deeper issue. And I think already these companies are 10 years ahead of where the politicians are at to be honest, I think they've already concocted the next game. 10 years ahead. 10 years ahead. Sean, can I just bring you in because you've been following European politics for a while, and Pascal Dunn who obviously has that role as president of the Eurogroup now, just politically speaking, how do you think Ireland played its hand here, if you could call it that it would be so crude because, you know, obviously the pressure as Aidan has mentioned came on from the Biden administration, you know, Trump tried this but just wasn't as organized as Biden. And Biden, you know, has really shot this at the top of the always see the agenda. We saw the charm offensive but you know, Secretary Yellen was in Ireland's meeting Pascal, etc. And all of a sudden, Ireland, you know, got its concession, not at least 15%, 15%. How do you think, you know, the Irish government played its hand here? On mute, Sean. Sorry, we know that Ireland has obviously been under huge pressure in relation to corporate tax for some time obviously we had the CCCTB consolidated corporate tax rate, our base, and that didn't get anywhere. And Ireland is always saying that it's, you know, constructively engaging and obviously got those guarantees around the Lisbon Treaty and, you know, there's a feeling in Brussels that the Irish government has a sort of emotional and the Irish people actually has an emotional attachment to 12.5% corporate tax rate because and that's that's what an interesting thing. If you look at the journalists or even politicians around here, they would assume that the Irish government's pursuing, you know, retaining 12.5% and, you know, other loopholes because the Irish people wanted it because they saw it as the Harbinger or the catalyst to having the Celtic Tiger and so on. And so then there was a, there has been obviously a consensus that Ireland couldn't, it wasn't sustainable that Ireland could continue to resist this and obviously Secretary Yellen had been had many conversations with Pascal Donahue behind closed stores here in Brussels, and she went to Dublin as well. And I think there's a feeling that Ireland was sort of brought kicking and screaming but at the same time. I mean, everybody understands that every country has their own, I suppose, comparative advantage and this was Ireland's and Ireland has made a strong case about geographic geographically located elsewhere. And I think that eventually, you know, I think that when you look at the debate around the Pascal Donahue becoming president of the Eurogroup. You had the southern countries, Greece, Spain, and so on and others really resisting his presidency because they felt this is going to be as they did the as it was dubbed the Google presidency of the Eurogroup because he would be pro multinationals, rather than trying to pursue what was being prepared the OECD and a much more fairer tax system. And so I think there was, they were glad that Ireland gave in in the end, but again, as Aidan said, nobody's I don't think anybody really feels that 12.5% 15% means that multinationals are going to somehow pay fair tax or that countries like France, for example, we're doing it in that regard for that reason alone they obviously wanted to ensure that they had their fair share of taxation from digital services point of view, but also maybe get their fair share of investment from these companies as well. Yeah, I mean, I just find even this conversation is fascinating because sometimes I feel like, you know, our organization and others have been working on, you know, taxes as a justice issue for for decades. And I sometimes feel listening to the debate happening in Ireland is almost like talking about gun control in the United States. There's just this kind of refusal to consider it from the bigger picture perspective. So one of my, my colleagues, former colleagues, Dr. Matthew Cahonan who was in LSE and the base in London, they led a bunch of economic research to try and estimate what was lost and the final figure they came out with was that poor developing countries lose about 400 billion US dollars a year as a result of avoidance schemes by large multinational companies and also extremely wealthy individuals. Now, as Aiden will tell you as well, the data is really, really messy. A lot of it is in public. So these are estimates, but it gives you a picture of, you know, the direction of travel and the scale of what we're talking about. And then as a development organization, by contrast, that's more than twice what is given every year in official overseas aid for the entire world. So you have this sort of weird contrast almost a robbing Peter to pay Paul type situation. And it's in Ireland's case, it is a contrast between our hard one and well earned reputation on human rights multilateralism equitable development on the one hand, and then our undeniably central role in facilitating schemes like the double Irish that Aiden talked about. Similarly, you look at the reaction to the OECD process. I mean, the papers were covered in stories about Ireland's success. I don't really think there is a serious attempt to interrogate the bounds of that success. So in that particular instance, our success was essentially in driving the rate down as low as possible. We were the guy or one of a small number of people in the room trying to make sure that the limited number of huge companies that the deal will apply to will pay as low as possible. I think the average corporate income tax rate was closer to 21 25%. So we have replaced a global race to the bottom with a sort of global race to the minimum. And I think what needs to change and it is some sort of a recognition or a serious recognition of the fact that schemes like the double Irish or the single month that replaced it. What they do is that they siphon revenue away, not just from France and Germany but also from some of the poorest countries in the world. And then they take a slice of it and then it heads off to Bermuda or the Caimans or in many instances heads off to the bank accounts of some of the biggest and most profitable companies in the world. And I laughed at there was a really good Irish Times podcast, I think it was Hugh Linden with Noam Chomsky. I think he was speaking as well, and he really wide ranging but he was asked about this, and it was put to him that look, you know, it is a tough world. It's competitive. It's dog eat dog. Everybody wants a slice of this and it's me or the other guy. And he kind of chuckled and he said, Well, that was also the world view of the tail of the hunt. And I mean, I think he was only being semi serious but there is a point there, because that sort of it's us and them mentality. That's the opposite of the message that Ireland gives on its foreign policy and so many other issues. And we are always the ones who are trying to emphasize the to our credit, the value of multilateralism and a coordinated approach. If everybody goes into their own trenches to their own interests on climate change, we won't do it. It's a global problem. If everybody just looks after themselves on vaccine equality, we won't do it. It's a global problem. And it's one of those areas where I think we still haven't joined the dots between a kind of a shorter term arguably faric victory on facilitating these schemes and the impact that it is having. I've seen it in some of the poorest countries in the world and what's happening in the OECD I think Aiden got its spot on when he said that all of the focus here and Shona as well on how it's perceived in Brussels. The 12.5% rate took on this kind of totemic importance. It was a symbol, but really the biggest egregious avoidance scandals that happened here, the stuff that ends up on the front of the New York Times, the double Irish and so on. That wasn't really about the statutory rate. It was about the series of allowances and breaks on intellectual property and other things that enable the effective rate pay to be many, many, many points lower than that. And that side of the deal, the pillar one, the whole scope of who gets what and when is still going to be trashed out in Paris and in the summer where I think eventually Ireland is going to have to reckon with the fact that the rest of the world isn't really going to accept for too long. I don't think a kind of a beggar thy neighbor approach. It doesn't make sense. And even though we would another development organizations would be highly critical of the draft texts of the OECD or what we have so far in terms of how it reflects the interests of bigger countries and so on, but at the same time it has won an important principle in that it is recognizing that the race to the bottom has to hit its base. It can't get any lower than this. And similarly, the work to try and better align taxable profits to really economic activity where the work is done, where the sales are made, where the products are produced and not just where the IP is housed is going to happen. The chances are like a lot of this stuff, the reform is going to be really, really modest and incremental. It won't meet the standards of justice set by all the usual suspects. But I think it was a kind of a hopefully will be a turning of a tide moment. And if, if people, I think as a country, if we even if you do take that sort of self interest position of how much can we get out of this, you have to recognize the tide turning and saying, okay, we have made this money and these resources. What are we going to invest it in? If you said what was the term shown of the kind of comparative advantage argument and I've heard officials say that a lot as well and there's a lot of truth to that. So you have to say, well, can we develop a comparative advantage beyond the sort of tax games that have been rightly criticized for a number of years. I think it's going to have to change one way or the other and we'd be better off kind of getting out in front of it. We've had a long time because we've been having this conversation for, you know, well over a decade and I actually think the Irish government did hide behind multilateralism actually because when it was when the conversation was being had in Brussels, consistently where there was Michael Noonan or Pascal Dunner and so on would say we'll have to wait to what the OECD says because we can't ask first is the European Union because you know then the US will just, even though almost has much higher corporate tax rate, we need to act in unison and for several years we're waiting for what the OECD wants to say and then reluctantly still did pass it but I hope you're right about the tide being turning but if you look at the fact that the government fought so hard to ensure that 15% was all that they had to move towards, it'd be a long time before they shift again and I agree with you fully on the debate in Ireland because even when I was listening to radio programs and so on, the context was very much how much this is going to cost us and that's reasonable because obviously everyone has to worry about the Exchequer but nowhere was there not well not as much anyway was there like the game is sort of up for this and let's try to have another comparative advantage as well as having you know reasonable tax offering. That's hard and is still very low. The problem for Ireland is just how structurally dependent it is on these companies that's that's the real issue here. So the Irish state as much as I may normatively disagree with them and I would agree with Conor in terms of his perspective on global tax justice here. So they just benefit too much from it. 20% of total revenue in Ireland comes from the corporate tax sector. That's excluding the amount of personal income that comes from the higher paid professionals that work in these sectors, even though it only contributes let's say 510 to 20, let's say indirectly 20% of employment. So this is the real problem I think for Ireland is how does it wean itself off that drug effectively, and how does it generate an alternative growth model, because I just don't see that at the moment. And until that happens, we can probably expect the media, you know, to continue to frame this issue in a totally self interested this is about Ireland being this is about defending us and even the language that's used here and actually I run a survey experiment with a colleague of mine, from a long time ago, where we tried to assess whether how media framing of corporate tax impacts public opinion, and we found very clearly how the Irish media frames public, or the corporate taxes was totally about Ireland think it's a nationalism is our self interest is what those people trying to take our money, whereas every other country did this frame much more on the basis of morality and fairness and tax justice, and you can see that very clearly Ireland really is the not just Ireland but other small states and no little tax and jurisdictions and tax havens the spectrum between the two really benefit from this, so the state itself is complicit in these global tax games, and I think that's the real political issue. Man in Brussels is after our tax basically. Yeah, now look, I mean showing you know yourself and the same for myself working in comms at the IA, you know, whenever you're trying to sell some of the European issues it's always tax or Brexit, and those are the two games and towns over the last 10 years. And I do want to jump on just to some questions or some questions coming in from the audience. I mean we could see her all day, talking about tax and it was absolutely fascinating to hear your insights there. And the question here is it's registered you corner but I think everyone on the panel might have something to add on it. Yeah, Ross is Patrick, and the UK government is set to introduce reforms to Human Rights Act, which many human rights lawyers are criticizes being fueled by pistol rhetoric, rather than necessity. I see this as part of the broader international pushback against fundamental human rights norms. As we've seen in Hungary and Poland for example, and if so how should the EU grow respond to this growing international coalition of a liberal states corner to you forced on that, and then other panelists join me. Yeah, I think that that is listening to some colleagues in the UK and some legal scholars who just, you know, can't believe that it's almost a misnomer to talk about an amendment to the Human Rights Act it's one of the first things that we have a parliamentary motion like that that will retrench and strip people of their rights. And it's it's it's hard to say whether it's it's part of that kind of bigger trend there's a part of me that thinks that it's, it's uniquely British that it's kind of an extension to the bigger cultural debate that has kind of taken off in the UK over the last, I don't know 10 years maybe Brexit as a touch point on that. And the, the sort of cultural divide on on different issues. I think it's kind of been reflected in what the British government are doing at the moment. And the idea the man and they have managed to paint a lot of the human rights protections in both British and European law as some sort of an infringement on people, rather than the but the kind of thing the that we look against some of the excesses of precisely those same governments. And I think it's, it's remarkable and it's grim to see how far it's gone. Another one of the things that we've witnessed in our work around the world is this sort of rise of a liberal politics the previous Israeli government under Benjamin Netanyahu, Bolsonaro in Brazil, and it has been kind of jarring to see the differences strike up, you know, like the, the, the kind of camaraderie between BB Netanyahu and Victor Orban, despite the fact that you would assume, given the his party's position. They shouldn't have been natural bedfellows but they were, and they would you saw people like that around the country uniting around this imagined common enemy. I hope that there is a, I hope and I think that there is a significant kind of counter measure or a counter movement springing up though. And I think sometimes the rise of the right and this retrenchment of human rights around the world can be a little bit overplayed. I think there is just as big and vibrant a movement again driven by young people who are drawing the link between climate justice, who are talking about racial justice in the United States and around the world, who are kind of refusing to accept this slide, and I certainly hope that that that side of the ledger wins out. But it's, it's hard to see what's, what's happening in the UK and the fact that a lot of the measures that are being taken there often in in response to totally being really misrepresenting the purpose of human rights law and the protections that are there. Shona, I mean we had Frank Clark, former chief justice speech was recently and he was talking broadly about rule of law issues but I mean the UK came up and sort of these these, these, these repeals of laws and what's what they're what their motivations were and you know he was he was aghast and he sort of said you know nobody's really talking about this in the same way as they were about Hungary and Poland what's what's your own sense. I mean, this is, this is a bit like Brexit in a way because you've had a series of British politicians for many years reading against the European Convention Human Rights Theresa May when she's home secretary, she was trying to have the UK remove themselves from it even though they were still in the EU, she was a remainder and it's prerequisite to be in the European Convention to be a member of the European Union, and she had conjured this problem, which was that they were trying to extradite a Jordanian man to Jordan for, for trial, and the problem was that he would breach his right to fair trial because some of the evidence used against him was obtained through torture. Anyway, in the end, all they had to do was negotiate with the Jordanian government and and the Jordanians gave a commitment under the European Convention that the evidence and that evidence will be admitted from the trial the one that was obtained through the trial and then the situation was sorted, but Theresa May saw this as sort of an obstacle to her role as, you know, home secretary which it wasn't it was just a provision. The, you know, the indirrogable right to a fair trial that everybody has regardless of your European Convention or not this has continued for many years. I think the Human Rights Act, which is interpretation of the European Convention is that the European Convention if human rights is littered through the Good Friday agreement adherence to is it it's also in the Brexit negotiations the withdrawal agreement so you're it's a whole new problem that will emerge then but similarly when you look at the debate I mean I saw Domic Raab recently saying that they'd have their own new Bill of Rights a British one. I think it was British MPs that wrote the convention human rights, I mean he is just as you should know that, but he said he protects quintessentially British rights, such as the right to protest and so on which they're also trying to undermine. I mean, that it's so nonsensical and so illiterate. And so, and therefore so dangerous was it so populist and simplistic that Frank Lark was right this discussion needs to be had because if you see the rolling back of rights the way it is and the speed at which it's being done in the UK with pretty much the same approach comes to refugees breaching again the refugee convention, and we don't know where it's going to end, particularly if the Tories remain in government for the next few years and we don't see Kier Starmer who's a lawyer himself, and defending or trying to extremely worrying and the, as I said the implications for the good fight the agreement are also quite important. Yeah, anything to add on this. No, no, no. Connor, Sean is something of well if you start talking about the Tory party now it could be here for an hour or so. The thing that Shona said there that took out to me is that that's a really good point on this idea of the retrenchment of human rights because sometimes there can be a tendency in the western world of the human rights community to kind of consider these things as set and settled, you know that it's just this line of progress and that you're always going to go in one direction, but the idea that you can you can spend a long time trying to win protections or freedoms or rights that can be rolled back. And I think in the United's like, if you contrast in Ireland, where you had this decades of campaigning around the eight amendment and reproductive rights, and it was always compared to the United States, and then over there over the last year as far as I can see there's been this really strong and serious attack on role versus weight and there is the potential that that right that was hard one could roll back. I think it's a good reminder that all of the things that you know that we have won and value whether it's workers rights, whether it's LGBT rights whether it's it's women's rights reproductive health or whatever. You can never just go okay well that's bank now and we'll move on to the next thing you always have to be willing to defend it and you're never going to get a press pause in time moment. Certain things were settled, you know the right to a fair trial and so on but if you look at the border between, you know, in the UK where you see migrants and refugees trying to come through. You see people with raving union jack flag saying the UK needs to leave the 1951 refugee convention. So what so they can legally send people back to their deaths, you know, I mean these are basic provisions to allow people claim asylum like other people or persons in the world is allowed to do and this is where we're at in the UK. It's extremely worrying. And again, I suppose with COVID and with Brexit and triumphalism and so on. The debate isn't being had about how about the impact of this because it's always going to be minorities and people who are just different that are going to be impacted as opposed to, I suppose, original British nationals or white British nationals and so on. One final question I suppose we're going back to the start we're going back to Germany, it comes from Alexander Conway, and it's not anybody in particular so so feel free to chime in. It's regarding Germany's worsting relations with Russia, and specifically then what are the consequences for sort of a deteriorating German Russian relationship for Europe and suspension of delay at the Nord Stream pipeline, etc. So, you know, decision to expel to Russian diplomats he just he just wonders, and is that something that's going to heat up in 2022 and as it's something that we can see having an effect now in the post Merkel, post Merkel era. Sean, I'm gonna start with you on that. Well that's really the topic of debate today and tomorrow at the European Council and don't think it is not really just a German Russia issue it's obviously European Union it's a NATO issue because there are fears. And that Russia is about to invade Ukraine, there's 190,000 combat ready troops on the border. And NATO is unlikely to come to the rescue view crane we saw that 2014 we saw this year what happened in Afghanistan, and like and failure, moral failure military failure of the world to protect those people now they're under the, the leadership of the Taliban and suffering greatly so we don't have any hope really that Europe or nature is going to come to rescue Ukraine so it's really dental negotiation and what the EU is going to do and we'll discuss today and tomorrow is the, the depth and the length of the sanctions that will apply to Russia, if they were to do that. Now Mario Draghi the Italian leader said today that he doesn't believe that Putin is about to do that he said he's spoken to Putin over the past few days. There's no engagement anyone's assurances that there won't be any eastern spread of NATO, and but it's still a very worrying thing and the Nord Stream to that is left open I mean it's already the pipeline itself is ready to go as we know bypasses Ukraine, Poland goes from Russia directly to Germany, but there's obviously a very important discussion to be had about any European member state relying so much on energy, especially gas from Russia. And it's been put off for the moment for bureaucratic reasons but it's really is the question of 2022 at the moment aside from the obvious COVID which I actually haven't discussed tonight which is. Have a talk to us all right now. COVID free hour. Keep it going. Anything on Russia Germany or EU Germany more widely. I started talking with Russian nationalism and put in a bit like a party we could be here for a while I would just I would just repeat the last thing again I mean the structural dependence that the EU has that Germany has an imported gas from Russia is crucial here. And you can see, and it's related to our second topic on climate justice etc and kind of financing the transition and how do you generate popular support and political will to make that transition. You know it's going to be very difficult if you're, you're lying upon somebody like Putin and Russia to fundamentally generate the energy that's necessary to power your electricity. And you know the price effect etc that happened etc. I think it's probably fair to say that the geopolitics between Russia and the EU had some role to play in terms of constraining supply and the imported gas and how that was impacting prices and the disruption, because we can see very clearly whether it's house prices whether it's electricity prices, the prices start going up for those who can't afford to pay as you're going to get a political backlash. It's amazing you say that because like I sometimes the chips just fall in a very unusual way, and now you've got this situation where something could possibly unite Greenpeace and Greta Thunberg, and the the fiscal and the interventionist right and the EPP where they basically all say it is madness to be relying on this oil and gas, and maybe for very, very different reasons this is the kind of thing that's going to push to a greater investment in renewable energy in the European Union from very different base. I think there's a lot of motivation though if it happens on the greater good I suppose. Absolutely look, we've come to the end of the hour, and that just leaves me to thank you on behalf of the people watching in for your for your insights I think we covered a range of topics. I found the discussion fascinating so we could have gone on for an hour or two. Thank you very much. And that just leaves me to wish everybody watching. And happy Christmas and hope you have a good Christmas break and saying to all of our panelists so thanks again for joining us. Happy Christmas.