Michael O’Leary thinks that the Irish Government should tell the EU to “f**k off”

Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary has never shied away from giving his tuppence worth on political issues.

In his latest statement, O’Leary gave his advice on the tax dispute between Apple and the European Commission, advising that the Irish Government should tell the EC to “f**k off”.

“One of the fundamental principles of the European Union is that each country has its autonomy to make its own tax decisions. Frankly, the Irish Government should turn around-they shouldn’t even appeal the decision-they should just write a letter to Europe and tell them politely to fuck off The idea that you have the state aid mob- who’ve more court verdicts overturned than any other department in Europe in the last 20 years-come along 10 years after the fact and say, ‘no we didn’t like that, we think you should have done something else’, is frankly bizarre"

https://twitter.com/Independent/status/771075871876587521 The multinational tech firm is set to appeal the decision, delivered by European Union Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, and O'Leary believes that this appeal could be successful.

“I think there’s no chance of this surviving a court ruling in Europe. There’s certain things that Europe don’t have competence in” he said.

However, others are warning against Ireland defying the European Commission ruling. Speaking yesterday on the Sean O’Rourke show, Donal O’Donovan, a former International Monetary Fund director does not believe that Ireland could win an appeal.

“I think they should hold the horses and reflect on this for a number of reasons. First of all, what grounds do they have for thinking that they will win the appeal? The Commission, on this highly controversial subject, presumably thought long and hard before it came out with its ruling, and it must be fairly confident that it can withstand this and win in a European Court.”

The next cabinet meeting to discuss the matter is due to take place on Friday.