Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)

I refer the Deputy to the statements made by the chairman of the Revenue Commissioners, Mr. Frank Daly, to the Committee of Public Accounts when he appeared before it on 9 November 2006. In response to questions from the Chairman of the Committee of Public Accounts on the amount of money that may be owed to taxpayers and a suggestion that, in the case of PAYE taxpayers, large amounts are not owed in individual cases, Mr. Daly said Revenue had made a total of 485,000 repayments up to the end of October 2006, involving an amount of €353 million. He said this was the factual situation in respect of what was claimed and repaid and that it was difficult to speculate about what more might be reclaimable. Mr. Daly said he was reluctant to put a figure on what had not been claimed but repeated the figure of €353 million claimed to the end of October 2006 and gave the comparable figures for 2004 and 2003, which were €325 million and €295 million respectively. Mr. Daly suggested that to say almost the same amount remained unclaimed as had been repaid would be an overstatement but perhaps there is a further €100 million unclaimed.

The figures quoted by the chairman of the Revenue Commissioners clearly show that taxpayers are becoming more aware of their entitlements and, as a consequence, the number of repayment claims and the amounts being repaid are increasing year on year. During August, September and October this year Revenue ran an intense high-profile campaign to encourage taxpayers to claim the reliefs to which they are entitled. This campaign involved advertisements on radio, bus shelters, the DART and the Luas. There is also a continuing campaign involving the placement of leaflets and claim forms in clinics, doctors' surgeries and pharmacies to encourage take-up of the relief available for medical expenses. There has been a positive outcome to this campaign which is shown in a significant increase in the number of people contacting Revenue and claiming entitlements particularly relating to trade union subscriptions, bin charges and age, rent, home carers and dependent relative credits.

There are preliminary indications that claims for some of these reliefs have more than doubled following the Revenue campaign. It is expected that the campaign will also lead to an increase in the number of claims relating to health expenses at the end of this year and early in the new year when the majority of such claims are normally made.

The Revenue Commissioners can only allow tax credits or reliefs on the basis of information that is known to them and, consequently, there is no way for Revenue, with or without the involvement of the CSO, to accurately assess underclaimed entitlements where changes in individual circumstances have not been notified by the people concerned. Revenue's attempts to bring the existence of various reliefs to the attention of those that might benefit from them is a far better use of resources than a statistical exercise, which of its nature could not achieve that result.

I am satisfied that Revenue takes a very proactive approach to ensuring that individuals are made aware of and are granted their entitlements and that further initiatives in this regard will be forthcoming in the future.

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