Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy McHugh for raising this matter, which I am taking on behalf of the Minister who is unavoidably absent. I ask Deputies to excuse any errors I may make in reading out replies as I am using a pair of borrowed reading glasses, having lost my own glasses this afternoon.

The programme of revaluing all commercial and industrial properties in the State for rateable valuation purposes is the responsibility of the Valuation Office, which is headed by the Commissioner of Valuation. The commissioner is independent in the exercise of his statutory functions, which are principally derived from the Valuation Act 2001.

The national revaluation programme was provided for in the 2001 Act and the expectation was that the complete revaluation of all commercial property in the State would take ten years to complete. This assumption has proven over time to be overly optimistic. To date, the revaluation programme has been completed in the South Dublin County Council area in 2007 and in Fingal and Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown county councils in 2009 and 2010, respectively. The revaluation of Dublin City Council area began in May 2011 and will be completed with the publication of a new valuation list in December 2013, which will become effective for rating purposes from January 2014.

I assure the Deputy that the Government is aware of the importance of accelerating the national revaluation programme and this is a feature of its Action Plan for Jobs 2012 strategy. Such a comprehensive revaluation of property has not been undertaken since the middle of the 19th century.

The revaluation programme is required to take account of the differential movements in property values that have occurred over a prolonged period of time and therefore maintain uniformity in the valuation base. Such uniformity is essential to achieve the policy objective of ratepayers paying commercial rates on an equitable basis. This, in turn, supports a more competitive business environment and improved compliance.

With the express objective of accelerating the revaluation programme, the Government published the Valuation (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill 2012 on 3 August 2012 as part of its legislative programme. The Bill proposes a number of specific measures in this regard. It provides a statutory basis to enable the Valuation Office to establish pilot schemes for outsourcing some of the revaluation work and exploring the possibility of introducing an element of self-assessment by ratepayers to the valuation process.

Additional provisions in the Bill seek to streamline the current valuation process and each of these will help to speed up progress. The Bill proceeded through Second Stage in the Seanad in October 2012. Officials in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and Valuation Office are engaged with a wide range of stakeholders and other interested parties on potential amendments that may be introduced on Committee Stage.

The Valuation Office is continuing to extend the revaluation programme. The Commissioner of Valuation signed valuation orders for the three Waterford rating authority areas on 12 December 2011 and Limerick County Council and Limerick City Council on 29 March 2012. The Waterford and Limerick revaluations will be completed in 2013 and 2014, respectively. At that stage, approximately 33% of all rateable properties in the country, representing more than 50% of the national valuation base in monetary terms, will have been revalued. The commissioner has also indicated his intention, subject to a statutory consultation process which is now under way, to sign valuation orders for Galway City Council and Carlow and Kilkenny rating authority areas during 2013.

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