Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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I will respond to some general questions first and then I will look for advice on some of the specifics. Solicitors’ fees are paid to recover tax. Far more is recovered than fees paid so that is an advantage. If we increase activity in this area, we collect more revenue.

Deputy Doherty is probably familiar with the background to the disabled drivers grant. The European Commission took us to the European Court of Justice and the scheme was deemed to be illegal under European law because of our treating one category of people differently from another for excise purposes. There is a tolerance allowed on the payment of excise but the decision was that disabled drivers would have to operate within the same band, meaning a serious loss in the rebate of excise for disabled drivers. Having examined this, we decided we would try to allow the same level of recoupment in respect of disabled drivers by way of grant rather than rebate. The Revenue Commissioners decided, because this was happening so quickly, to take responsibility for that although they normally do not pay out money. Money was put into the Estimate. In the final days of the negotiations before Christmas, the European Commission allowed us an extra year in which to get in line. This has gone on for approximately four years. We have delayed and delayed in so far as we could because I certainly did not want to take away any rebate that disabled drivers were getting. However, we are now at the point where we must change what we are doing. We have been given an extra year. The lump sum in an allocation for Revenue is now not needed so that will come back as a saving. I will discuss with officials in my Department and the Department of Social Protection the question of which Department we should allocate the money to if we move to a grant scheme. This is being operated by four staff of the Revenue Commissioners in Monaghan who receive all the claims. It is a receipt-based system. The intention is to maintain the same level of advantage for disabled drivers based on what they spend on fuel, but we will do so in a different way. We believe this will be legally acceptable. We have succeeded in getting an extra year in which to put the alternative arrangement in place.

With regard to Deputy McGrath's question, the targeted audits seem to be proceeding much better than the general audits. They are yielding more. The Deputy asked about the sectors that are yielding more.