Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

This section extends the vehicle registration tax, VRT, relief for hybrid electrical vehicles until December 2018 and for electric vehicles until December 2021. I have no issue with that. I have always wondered whether one of those vehicles would get me from Gweedore to Leinster House but we will have to wait for more advances before we can go down that road without having to stop and plug in. There is a view that VRT has been ruled to be illegal or that the European Union will impose a fine on Ireland for applying vehicle registration tax. Will the Minister outline the accurate legal position and our interactions with the European Court of Justice on Ireland's application of VRT? He might also outline whether there is a case pending in the European Court of Justice regarding Ireland's levying of the full VRT on hired and leased cars from abroad, and presumably across from the Border. It is an issue in my county where cross-Border workers are supplied with a car. For example, when health board staff in the North travel across the Border to Donegal where they reside, they have to pay VRT on the vehicle and it is not their car.