Ireland pledges co-operation on global tax avoidance plan Ireland's prime minister insisted on Wednesday that his country does not cut special deals with foreign companies to help them avoid taxes and said Dublin will continue to work with the EU and international authorities to set up a global regime to fight tax avoidance. Enda Kenny said EU authorities have not asked about Ireland's tax treatment of Apple or other multinational companies in spite of this week's report by US Senate investigators alleging the California-based computer group used Irish tax loopholes to avoid billions in US taxes. "We do not do special deals with any individual company in regard to that tax rate," Mr Kenny said at an EU summit intended to address tax evasion. Our country has had a stable corporate tax rate for many years but that's not the only reason that companies come to Ireland. It is because of our technology, because of our record and because of our talent pool. Asked whether Apple executives were inaccurate when they told a US Senate hearing the company had negotiated a deal with Dublin to lower its corporate taxes, Mr Kenny said he "disagreed" with what was said in Washington. Ireland's parliament will hold its own hearings into tax avoidance by multinational corporations next month amid the fall out from damaging revelations that Apple and Google have saved billions of euros in tax using subsidiary companies based in Ireland. Ciaran Lynch, chairman of the Irish parliament's finance committee, told the Financial Times that the committee will probably hold the hearings June 19 and will call the heads of Apple, Facebook and Google's Irish operations for questioning about their company's tax affairs. "The issue we are investigating is not Ireland's 12.5 per cent rate of corporate tax but rather global taxation governance and how multinationals manage to reduce their tax obligations," Mr Lynch said. Tax evasion was put on Wednesday's EU summit agenda by Herman Van Rompuy, European Council president, in March after a French minister responsible for cracking down on tax cheats admitted to hiding €600,000 in a Swiss bank account. Although there were no concrete measures taken at the summit, François Hollande, the French president, insisted the EU's focus on the issue had put potential tax evaders on notice. Those who thought they could avoid taxation by turning to tax havens should understand now that there is no longer impunity. It will come to an end and there's a serious risk of being identified," said Mr Hollande. Asked about Apple's issues in Ireland, Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, expressed an interest in ensuring corporations pay taxes in countries where "value added" occurs, but said the topic of corporate tax loopholes did not come up at the summit. "The generation of profits and tax payment have to be linked in individual countries," she said. It was not an issue for this summit because we said we first wanted to take on tax evasion. Although the summit was originally intended to address tax avoidance by individuals, the Apple dispute has pushed the issue of corporate tax on to the agenda. However, no concrete actions on either individual or corporate tax evasion were taken. A long-delayed directive that would force countries to share information on foreigners with savings accounts in their country continues to be stalled by Austria and Luxembourg, although there were increasing signs that their opposition is easing. Additional reporting by Peter Spiegel and Joshua Chaffin in Brussels