Results 1-20 of 7,216 for speaker:Michael Fitzmaurice

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: I thank all the witnesses for their attendance. Who have they engaged and met with to educate themselves about this situation? Did they engage with Teagasc?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: Did they visit any farms?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: That needs to be done urgently. This issue has been dragging on for seven to eight months. Farmers have been left in a quagmire, with no definite answers forthcoming. Whatever about a good decision or a bad decision, no decision is the worst of the lot. Farmers are left waiting for money. I know farmers who have not even heard back from Revenue. That is not a great situation. If I...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: A hay barn or whatever.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: Okay. If I put down bolts and put the shed up on those bolts, it is a permanent structure. If I put up my meal bin in the same way, what is the difference? They are both bolted.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: What is a meal bin?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: Is a 10-tonne meal bin a structure?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: That is good to know. What about mats for slats?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: A mat cannot be cemented.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: It is bolted down.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: I am trying to establish whether the witnesses understand the situation for farmers. This is why it is so important that they engage with either Teagasc or the farmer organisations and go out to farms to see for themselves what is there. If the mats are put on the slats, they are bolted down. If a farmer wants to take them up, it will rip the slat or the mat. The second point is that no...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: That is grand. There is one thing I cannot get my head around. The witnesses indicated that if a meal tank is built on a new build, the VAT can be reclaimed, but it cannot be reclaimed on other than a new build. What is the thinking behind that? If I have a big door where I have the tank, whether it is an old place or a new place, the tank has to go into it. You build the building and...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: Mr. Egan should be mindful of one thing. Revenue deals with this day in, day out. You get a small farmer who has 40 or 50 acres and you might have another farmer who owns 400 or 500 acres. The second one might need a big bin, but the person with the 40 or 50 acres, in fairness, is entitled to get the VAT back. Such farmers make up most of rural Ireland.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: If Ms Lyons gives me a her details, I will contact her. If we, as TDs, ring Revenue, we will be told that we have to go back to the person involved. They do not give us anything. Is not that right?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: It is an issue with Revenue. If we get permission to make representations on behalf of someone who has a problem and we talk to Revenue, we will be informed that it can only talk to the person - who has the relevant tax or VAT number - in question. Every other Department that we talk to, such as agriculture or health, sends back replies and talks to us. Why is that the case?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: I will do that, but I am asking another question. Once a constituent comes to a TD and signs a GDPR permission, the TD becomes part of the process once he or she TD sends in a query. If there is an appeal, the TD would be part of the process. However, Revenue informs us that it cannot talk to anyone only the person concerned. Why is that the case, even though we have consent from people?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: I have one final question because I want to let other members in. The officials are saying that a change is not coming. However, there has been change. At one time, if you had a shed and you put in a tank, you would get the VAT back. That does not happen now. There has a change somewhere along the line. Off the top of my head, the change happened in September or around that time.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: Maybe a bit earlier. We are now almost halfway into the new year and we are still wobbling, over and back, trying to decide what is what. When will there be a definitive list for farmers? The problem, which Senator Lombard mentioned, is there are many farmers who will not buy something because they do not know whether they can get the VAT back. Maybe they can in a month's time, but what...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: It would have been paid already.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine: VAT Refunds to Unregistered Farmers: Revenue Commissioners (8 May 2024)

Michael Fitzmaurice: It is not that it is costing Revenue money as such. Someone in the circle to which I refer paid the money. My opinion is that the person who made the meal bin was paid the price plus the VAT by the farmer. VAT details are sent in every two months. Whatever the person paid out in VAT other than that, he or she put one against the other and the farmer went to claim it back. I would...