Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

There are very few people who pay no tax. At an income of €20,000, personal tax credits mean a person will be paying tax at 20% on that last bit of income.

There is a mirror trick here that is unfair. It has been more or less alluded to. Let us put it in simple terms. At the moment, if I am paying 40% tax on my salary - which happens at a fairly low individual income in this country - and I put €100 into my pension pot, that amount goes into the pension pot and there is no tax payable. Under the proposed system, if I am on the 40% marginal tax rate - I do not have to have much income to pay tax at 40% - and put €100 into my pension pot, 40% is taken away so I now only have €60 to invest. I get a kickback of another €15, which is one quarter of the €60. That means that for my trouble, even though I am a lot less well-off than a person earning €100,000 or €200,000 who puts an amount into the pot and gets a 40% kickback, I am getting €75 into my pension pot while the person on a very high income is getting €100 for the same €100 from their salary. I think my mathematics are correct. If I am paying 20% tax-----