Mr. Niall Cody:

I pay close attention to what the Chairman says at the beginning of the committee's meetings each week because I pay attention to what goes on. Some of my colleagues wonder do I work on Thursday mornings at all. The Chairman talks about the things on which the witnesses are not supposed to comment.

I regularly watch, and everybody seems to forget this happens at the start. What I said earlier is that I have replied to the Minister and set out the details. The Deputy spoke about independently provided data. That was data provided in replies to parliamentary questions via the Minister. It does not have the full breakdown because we do not have the full breakdown of each category. What is on the public record for 2017 is that the estimated number of taxpayers who availed of flat rate allowances was just over 606,000. There were gross claims in the region of €160 million, equating to a tax cost of somewhere around €48 million. It is dependent on whether people are taxable or not and whether they are taxable at 20% or 40%. Part of the reason the Minister has written to us is that we have tried to improve the information we will capture from tax returns for 2018. That will not be available until we process those returns next year. We will have more granular detail.

There are a number of items in the review. Some categories will get an increase, admittedly a smaller number than those that will get a reduction. In some cases it would seem to us that sectors are no longer entitled to a flat rate expense. We have identified a number of areas. A number of issues were the subject of discussion on Committee Stage of the Finance Bill, for example, relief on trade union expenses, which was in place until 2010, and relief on professional fees, which was restricted in 2010. Many tax credits were reduced in 2010.

I have written back providing more comprehensive data to the Minister. It is now part of a correspondence and it would be wrong of me to discuss it as it is now the Minister's letter. I expect I will receive a reply early next week and I will then review where we are with it. We will then be very clear.

One thing we said this time last year is that we do not operate in a vacuum. Revenue operates within the community. We live within the community. We are very conscious of how to operate a system based on voluntary compliance and self assessment. Some people are probably entitled to more than the flat rate expense because they have probably spent more. A global figure is always difficult because sometimes it involves averaging. It is very important. Sometimes when I am before this committee I think about the fact that if people do not have the expenditure and do not spend money we cannot allow a credit. They may be engaged in some type of work where they would have had to incur that expenditure previously. If the Comptroller and Auditor General decided this was an area worth examining I would imagine, as accounting officer, that if credit was being given where it should not I would be dealing with a different issue. What we did undertake publicly was not to implement the change until we finalised the review of everybody. We did this for reasons of fairness. What we will do, as we always do, is reflect on what we receive from the Minister. We will make our decision and we will publish it and make it available.