Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I support the concept of a wealth tax, as the Minister of State knows. I drafted legislation to provide for same but I do not support the proposal that is here. I believe the rate is too high and the tax is too broad. That being said, the principle is still there and I support that principle. The Minister of State's response was not surprising because it is very clear that this Government is not willing to look that any tax measure that applies to the elites, whether it is a wealth tax, closing down section 110 entities or making the banks, which are hugely profitable again, pay taxes. The latter two proposals were blocked by the Government with the support of Fianna Fáil. As the news was filtering through to the boardrooms of the banks that Fine Gael had blocked Sinn Féin's amendment aimed at ensuring that the banks paid an appropriate level of tax this year, next year and every year thereafter, Bank of Ireland was putting the finishing touches to a statement that it has just released acknowledging that it had screwed over another 6,000 Irish tracker mortgage customers. This is in addition to the 4,300 customers who were denied a return to their tracker mortgages. We understand, as does the Minister of State, the hardship those customers went through and we have just learned that another 6,000 customers were similarly affected. This is the type of institution or company that the Government has decided, in the context of votes cast in the last few minutes, should not be paying any tax. However, having read the CEO's statement, we still have no certainty as to when those individuals will be compensated and when the compensation process will be completed. The CEO refers to a "pathway", but there is no end date in sight for those 6,000 additional customers on top of the original 4,300. This is the kind of individual thinking with which we are dealing, but the Government has decided not to tax the bankers and other elites in society. I would welcome the Minister of State's views on the fact that Bank of Ireland has not set out clear timeframes for the compensation of the additional 6,000 tracker victims that it has acknowledged today.