Owen Paterson raises hopes of Northern Ireland business tax cut | UK news | The Guardian .

As the Guardian reports:

The newly appointed Northern Ireland secretary, Owen Paterson, would support an inquiry into whether the province should have a lower rate of corporation tax, he said today.

Speaking after meeting the first and deputy first ministers in Belfast, Paterson said he was "very keen that we publish a paper on how to devolve corporation tax to the devolved institutions".

Politicians and business leaders in Northern Ireland have been lobbying for a dramatic cut in corporation tax. They point across the border to the Irish Republic, whose corporation tax is only 12% — among the lowest in the western industrial world.

This is plain straightforward economic madness.

If it happens wait 15 minutes for every major company in the UK to claim all their profits arise in Northern Ireland and see the entire corproate tax take of the UK slashed over night.

I'll be returning to this theme - but of all the madness the ConDems are releasing on the UK aright now this has to be one of the worst throught out.

Unless, of course, it is your aim to shift the whole burden of tax onto labour and free large scale capital of any serious tax charge at all. As I suspect is their objective.