Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 27 January 2022

Public Accounts Committee

Business of Committee

9:30 am

Photo of Brian StanleyBrian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We will deal with the substantive issue on the agenda. Are the statements noted? Agreed. As usual the listing of accounts and financial statements will be published as part of our minutes.

Moving to correspondence, as previously agreed, items that were not flagged for discussion at this meeting will continue to be dealt with in accordance with the proposed actions that have been circulated, and decisions taken by the committee in respect of correspondence are recorded in the minutes of our meetings and published on the web page.

The first category of correspondence under which members have flagged items for discussion is B, correspondence from Accounting Officers and-or Ministers and follow-up to matters relating to previous meetings.

No. 1009 B is correspondence from Mr. Niall Cody, chairman, Office of the Revenue Commissioners, dated 14 January 2022. It provides information requested by the committee on ten diverse issues, including the taxation of couriers, the number and associated value of seizures of drugs and cigarettes from 2019 to 2021, expenditure on facilities at Dublin Port and Rosslare Europort due to Brexit, a monthly analysis of the support Revenue has provided to each sector during the pandemic, and the settlement between Revenue and Perrigo. It is proposed to note and publish this item. It was flagged for discussion by me and Deputy Matt Carthy.

Two separate pieces of correspondence come under No. 1009. One gave a breakdown of the use of the voluntary PAYE scheme over the 15-year period from 2004 to 2018. There is a table of the gross pay of the taxation by a number of employees and number of employers. One thing that stood out, which I found very unusual, was that in 2018 the gross pay of those ten employers for 154 employees was €1,524,970 and tax paid €22,329, and the number of employees 154. That means that the wage for each employee was about just over €10,000. The taxation the PAYE paid was €144 for the year by employee. I want to take more time with this but it is something that we may have to follow up again with Revenue. There is certainly something unusual about that.

Deputy Carthy has left, but other members may wish to comment on the second document. It relates to bogus-self employment. Revenue have sent a document from the Chief Inspector of Taxes. It is copy of a document dated from 1997. It says that compliance of tax by couriers "was 'put on hold' until the status of couriers for tax and PRSI was concluded". This is from 7 March 1997. It states:

As you are aware, the Department of Social Welfare Appeals Office have decided that a motorcycle courier who provided his own equipment (e.g. motor cycle, special gear etc.) and was engaged under the standard courier contract was insurable as a self-employed contractor under the Social Welfare Acts.

While the decision is not binding on Revenue I propose, as previously stated, in the interest of uniformity and with a view to bringing the matter to a conclusion, to treat couriers as self-employed for tax purposes, whether deliveries are made by van, motorcycle or bicycle ...

That appears to be at complete odds with what we were told when Revenue was before the committee, namely, that there was not a uniform decision to treat all couriers as self-employed. The document refers to treating couriers as self-employed for tax purposes elsewhere. It can be seen that the decision was made to treat all couriers as self-employed. I wanted to bring that to the attention of the committee. If any member wants to come in on that, feel free. Any future engagement may have to revert back to that. We will note and publish that correspondence.

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