Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

This legislation will also provide for significant improvements in film tax relief aimed at enhancing Ireland's competitive position as a location for film making, a topic discussed at length by the Joint Committee on Finance and the Public Service. I am delighted with this development. The film industry is a mobile one that operates worldwide. If the tax regime is not right here, producers will just move to another country. Production companies do not have to be based here but can use this country as a base to make films. This provides a great deal of revenue, income and employment. Producers will only come here if the tax regime is sufficiently attractive to them. We must be able to compete with other countries.

I seek clarification on three or four sections and ask that they be further developed. Section 8 deals with the tax relief provisions in respect of service charges to take into account the introduction of the pay-by-use principle for local authority waste charges. The relief has been capped this year at a maximum of €400 per annum. In County Laois the waste service was privatised several years ago and the charge is in the range of €300 to €400. The relief will be capped at this rate from 2007 onwards, even though I expect the charges will increase above this in future.

I question why I and others who are in the high income bracket get tax relief whereas my next door neighbour in receipt of disability benefit is not entitled to get any from the Department of Social and Family Affairs. I hope the generosity which dictates that those who earn income are entitled to relief will also be extended to persons on social welfare, in the same way as they avail of the free schemes such as telephone rental and television licences. I say this in the interests of equity.

Most who have received their wheelie bin charges, especially from private sector operators, will have noticed the addition of 13.5% in VAT charges. This is an extra charge on the consumer. I hope the interpretation of EU rules or whatever led to this charge will ensure equity because the charge is too severe.

Section 11 provides that in future those getting relief for interest payable on borrowed money for rented property will have to register with the Private Residential Tenancies Board. This is a great idea and the provision is long overdue. It should be done. I call on the Minister to extend it one step further in order that those who receive rental subsidies through the Health Service Executive would also have to register with the Private Residential Tenancies Board. Although they are in a minority, some landlords have poor accommodation and would not pass the registration test. Such persons should not be getting money through the Health Service Executive for their poor accommodation.

Sections 34 and 35 deal with the inclusion of mental health services in the schedule of qualifying services to be provided in hospitals that qualify for tax relief in the private sector. This has long been advocated and I welcome its inclusion in the Bill. This sector of the health service has been neglected in recent years.

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