Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)

The Deputy's remarks in this regard are entirely wide of the mark.

She then proceeded to speak of golden circles in the context of property reliefs generally. The most fatal relief of all was the seaside resort scheme and Deputy Burton was a Minister of State in the Government that introduced it. As I always understood it, the scheme was introduced at the behest of the then Minister for Tourism and Trade, Deputy Kenny, to provide tax breaks to those who built seaside holiday homes all around the Irish coastline. The effect of that scheme is still with me in my Department. It is the most long-lasting and probably the most wasteful scheme of all and it was introduced by a Government of which Deputy Burton was a member. Consequently, she should not make allegations about golden circles. She would not appreciate it were I to suggest that the then Government introduced this scheme because it was associated with individuals who were part of a golden circle.

Deputy Burton rightly acknowledged that my predecessor, the Taoiseach, has phased out many of these property allowances. However, she then proceeded to an extraordinary economic analysis that suggested the existence of these tax reliefs were a substantial contributory factor to our current economic difficulties, which they are not.

See this speech in context