Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

I remind the Minister that the former Minister, Deputy McCreevy, promised to end some of the reliefs in the 2002 budget but changed his mind last year and extended them. As a consequence, some of the tax breaks will continue for at least another 15 years, thus enabling a golden circle to pay no tax while a single individual earning more than €28,000 per annum could end up paying tax at the 42% rate. This is the legacy of Deputy McCreevy's grossly inequitable and unjust tax system. People want to know what the Minister will do about this. Let me give one example of the inequities to which I refer. To be eligible for the small self-administered pension scheme, one would need to be able to invest at least €70,000 per year. How many ordinary workers can invest this much in a pension scheme?

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