Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Independent) | Oireachtas source

For the information of members, I would like to provide a context for the scale of the amounts we are talking about. In 2009, €115,000 was collected in fees from FOI. Under reasonable assumptions, about €64,000 was from the up-front fee of €15. Using a conservative assumption of a processing charge of €7 per fee, the net gain to the Exchequer from the up-front fees in 2009 would have been about €34,000.

The analysis I mentioned earlier used less conservative assumptions and found that the net gain was zero. We are talking about a potential net gain to the Exchequer of €30,000 to €35,000 from a regime that virtually no other country has and that is explicitly against the recommendations of the OECD and the EU. I think it is worth sharing with members the amount of money involved.