The Minister for Finance Michael McGrath has said that the Government will have to "reflect" on the accumulation of costs that have been imposed on businesses.
He said that while many of those costs have arisen from Government decisions and that individually those policy decisions "are good things", he added that the "aggregation of them has undoubtedly had a significant impact on a lot of businesses".
Minister McGrath made the comments after being asked if an auto-enrollment pension system, being led by Minister for Social Protection Heather Humphreys, would go ahead later this year.
He told reporters this morning that there's a lot of work to do before the auto-enrollment system takes effect.
"The legislation has to be considered, passed by the Oireachtas, and then the various systems set up," he said.
"But I would make the broader point that we do have to consider the combined impact of all of the different policy decisions that have already been made and reflect that in the future decisions that we make."
Separately, Minister McGrath was asked about calls to split VAT rates for the hospitality sector, allowing restaurants to avail of a 9% rate.
It followed comments from Taoiseach Leo Varadkar that such a measure warrants consideration.
Minster McGrath said that he understood that the Taoiseach's comments were made in the context of the next budget.
However, he cautioned that Revenue commissioners have expressed concerns around splitting the rate.
He said that there are no plans around changes to VAT rates for this year.
"We are in the process of finalising changes to the tax debt warehousing regime. I expect to be in position in the coming days to set out new flexibilities and new arrangements in respect of tax debt warehousing. That is a practical way that I can help businesses", he said.
