Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)

We know that the Government will railroad this through because it has a majority but I want to give the Minister of State an opportunity to consider again those on whom he is forcing this unjust and unfair poll tax. Will he consider exempting people who bought their homes over the past six years for €250,000 or €300,000 and who are in negative equity and who paid stamp duty? They were forced to buy to get on the property ladder and they were told they had to do this. People who bought their homes in confidence that would be able to live in them for the rest of their days and now find they have a pyrite issue should also be exempted. Jobseekers and other social welfare claimants such as old age pensioners, blind pensioners, those claiming family income supplement and those claiming disability allowance, the very people the Government tried to attack in the budget but had to step back from, can ill afford to pay this charge. This is an opportunity to review and broaden the exemptions.

My understanding is that the troika insisted on a property tax to extend the tax base. That can be interpreted in many ways. No Member is opposed to a property tax from the point of view of the wealthy paying a tax on their trophy homes. There are other ways to impose a property tax if that is what is needed. Anybody living in an average sized family home should be exempted from this charge. This is not a property tax; it is a family home tax that is being forced on 1.6 million people.

Reference was made to giving councils some form of accountability. The first thing that should be done is powers should be given back to local authority members to deal with environmental services and the section in the Planning and Development Acts giving all the power to the county or city manager to deal with these issues should be repealed. That would be a very good first step in regard to reforming the councils. They would be able to make those decisions themselves and not hide behind the skirts or suits of city managers, who impose these bin taxes, incinerators and the like on councillors who are elected by the people. That would be the way to go, rather than this way, which does not give councils any sort of accountability whatsoever. It would give councils a stick to beat ordinary people with if they did not pay this tax, and would tell the people they are at fault for not funding the services that are needed.

It is a clever trick which is being brought in by the Government but people can see beyond that and can see that €19 million has been cut from the budget of Dublin City Council on the basis that it will be funded through this unfair tax. This is an opportunity for the Government to reconsider it. The argument is that this will mean people who are affected will have an increase in property tax. If that is the case, the Government should be looking at those who earn under a certain amount, and whose houses are worth a certain amount, so those who can afford to pay a property tax will be those who will be hit. This is an opportunity for the Government to review the charge.

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