It’s easy to be a little perplexed by attitudes towards multinationals, given their transformative impact on our economy, their complete upgrading of our industrial base and the enormous capital and technological transfer their presence in Ireland has facilitated.

Economically, without multinational investment, Ireland would be Albania with brutal weather. Politically, without multinational commitment to Ireland, Ireland would likely have succumbed to the populist, nationalist, protectionist disease that is afflicting most western politics.