Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 7 July 2021

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach

General Scheme of the Finance (Local Property Tax) (Amendment) Bill 2021: Discussion

Photo of Steven MatthewsSteven Matthews (Wicklow, Green Party)
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I thank the Minister. That is a question which comes up now and again from people on limited incomes whose houses are of high value. There was much discussion of this issue - just after this was introduced - at local authority level where a lot of the decisions are made to raise or reduce the local adjustment factor. Senator Casey will remember the discussions we had many times at meetings of Wicklow County Council. It is very easy to estimate where money is being spent in a county. It is easy to work out the per capitaspend. Where that income is being generated from is harder to define with the LPT because one cannot identify the districts or areas that are generating the higher levels of LPT. In the interests of fairness and so that people within a county can see equity of spend across that county, is there provision for Revenue, which collects the tax, to identify the exact position, by municipal district or, possibly, electoral district, in order that we can finally show people there is equitable income and spend with the tax across a county? Is that possible? I was told at the time it was not but I believe there may be some progress on that now with Eircode postcodes.