Political – Over the past number of years the political side of things has been rocked

with a string of crises which has seen it transfer to something that people may not
trust and see it as being corrupt. There has been a number of scandals with MP’s
abusing their expense accounts and a number of different things they were claiming
when they should not off been doing1 . For example, it came out last week that an MP
had claimed over £30,000 on one of the houses he owned.

Economic – The past year has seen the UK come out of the recession slowly but
surely while leaving Ireland in its wake with them being on their knees needing a bail
out from the IMF. In recent weeks The Bank of England has been under some
scrutiny due to the corporate governance side of things in the bank and that the non
executive directors of the bank are not doing the job they are meant to be doing2.

Socio-Culture – In terms of the socio cultural side of things the UK is very similar to
Ireland when it comes to religion, language, methods of business and so on, the only
real difference is the fact that they are not in the euro zone which may be a problem
when dealing with foreign exchange and other aspects when dealing with currency. At
the moment the sterling is trading close to £1 = €1.15(as of 23 May 2011). During the
bad times the currencies were a lot closer and even up in Northern Ireland last
Christmas shops were selling things for £1 = €1 which was unheard of.

Technology – Recent statistics came out illustrating that there are 41 million users
online in the UK which is close to 2/3 people are online which if you think about it is
a massive number with something that has only really taking of in the past 8 – 10
years. An example of this is that there was an increase of 12.8% from ’09 – ’10 in
online money in the UK in the space of a year; it went from being £3.5 billion to £4.1
billion which is a huge amount of money in the space of a year3.

Environment – The environment you would consider the UK to be in at the moment

would be stable and going in the right direction, if you compare this with Ireland, at
the moment Ireland is not a very appealing place to do business in and it does not
have the same appeal as the UK would at the moment. The UK is considered to be out
of the recession and their economy is improving slowly but surely, this could be an
excellent time to start doing business over there as companies would be looking for
investments and companies.

Legal – With the UK and Ireland being so close to each other it is expected that not
many laws or anything would be to different from one another, the tax laws in the UK
would be similar to those in Ireland. With Ireland having to be bailed by the IMF the
taxes here are somewhat larger then the UK but not to much. Here is an example of
the two different tax rate systems:

UK rates4
1
“Scotlands future under Salmond” – The Financial Times limited 2011, article published 2011-05-13
2
“Fears rise over BOE governance” – By Norma Cohen. Financial Times limited 2011, article
published 2011-05-22
3
Guy Phillipson, chief executive IAB - http://iabplayer.com/default.aspx?video=4538 [accessed on 15th
May 2011]
4
Advice guide -
http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/index/your_money/tax_index_ew/income_tax_rates.htm [accessed 17th
Taxable income rate of tax
0 - £2,560 10 per cent (starting rate for savings only)
0 - £35,000 20 per cent (basic rate)
£35,001 - £150,000 40 per cent (higher rate)
Over £150,000 50 per cent (additional rate)

Irish rates5
Single / Widowed without dependent children €32,800 @ 20%, Balance @ 41%

Single / Widowed qualifying for One Parent €36,800 @ 20%, Balance @ 41%
Family Tax Credit

Married Couple - one spouse with income €41,800 @ 20%, Balance @ 41%
Married Couple - both spouses with income €41,800 @ 20% (with an increase of €23,800 max),
Balance @ 41%

May 2011]
5
Revenue - http://www.revenue.ie/en/tax/it/leaflets/it1.html#section3 [accessed 17th May 2011]