Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

There is no question that this is all about choices. I must contrast the signal the Taoiseach is sending to the parents who are worried about what the Minister for Social and Family Affairs said last night - which is, in essence, that child benefit will now be targeted in the forthcoming budget - with the answer given by the Minister for Finance last week to Deputy Burton when she put to him a different type of choice that he might make. I refer in particular to the treatment of the "golden ten" - the people who were loaned the money by Anglo Irish Bank to purchase shares in order to bail out the bank and bail out an even larger shareholder. We are now stuck with the bulk of that loan, three quarters of which was on a non-recourse basis, that is, supported only by the value of the shares themselves, which are now worthless. As a result, the taxpayer is stuck with a loss of some €300 million on that loan.

Deputy Burton pointed out to the Minister for Finance last week that not only are we stuck with the loss on the loan but that these people can write off the losses on the entire amount against their future capital gains tax liabilities. She pointed out that this did not seem to be a good idea and asked the Minister for Finance if he would do something about it. He replied that he had "no plans at this stage to make a change in this area", that "the current symmetry of treatment between losses and gains would be affected", and that this "would represent a significant change to our capital gains tax legislation".

Such a change is very necessary. We have a situation where the persons who borrowed this money and who contributed to the difficulties in the banking system will be able to claim tax relief on losses the taxpayer is already carrying while, on the other hand, the Government is telling parents to expect reductions in child benefit. There is no similar arrangement for those unfortunate householders who are now in negative equity and who may have to sell their homes because they cannot pay the mortgage or because they have to emigrate. They cannot write off losses against future tax liability as the "golden ten" are being allowed to do. Does the Government seriously propose to do nothing to address this anomaly in the forthcoming budget?

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