Ms Carol O'Farrell:

The revaluation programme was undertaken by the Commissioner of Valuation initially in 2005. To date revaluations have only been completed in the four Dublin authority areas, the Waterford areas and Limerick. A mammoth task was set for the Commissioner of Valuation this year, in that his main strategy was to achieve the revaluation of ten rating authority areas this year. That process is now almost complete. The proposed certificates have issued, the representation stage is complete and I understand the valuation lists for those ten rating authority areas will be published in September. It will be from the publication of the valuation lists that the 28-day period will run for the appeals to the tribunal.

It is important for this revaluation programme to continue apace because that is the only way that we will be able to achieve equity, uniformity and correctness of value, namely, if we base the valuations on modern rental property values. The Chairman will be aware that South Dublin County Council area has been revalued. It was revalued in 2007 and it has been revalued again. The Act envisages that there will be a sequential revaluation of all local authority areas and that once a revaluation is complete that the next one will take place in not fewer than five years and not more than ten years. It is important because the revaluations of the other Dublin local authorities will be due again. It is important for the Commissioner of Valuation to finish revaluing the remaining parts of the country in order to get all rating authority areas on this sequential five to ten-year cycle of revaluation.