Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Sinn Féin and Deputy Martin Ferris. This tax is extremely unfair. After studying the demands sent out by Revenue, one can see that the banding system is completely wrong. In many instances, elderly people and people who did not follow the matter properly took what was in the demand at its word and paid more tax than they should have paid. Between the household charge, the NPPR charge and the property tax, the Government has made a right dog's dinner out of this affair because it has caused confusion and upset and because everything it has done has been unfair and unjust. There were different ways of going about it if the Government got its head together properly. Instead, it went off on a tangent. What government in another state would come up with three different charges in two and a half years to cause confusion and upset?

Revenue came in here and admitted to us that the calculations they were sending out were totally wrong. I cited a house in Kenmare that was sold for €67,500. At the same time, Revenue put those people in band three. Everybody living in that townland believed that if Revenue sent something to them, they were supposed to be right. Those people were put in band three when the last property sold in that location, which was a new three-bedroomed property, made €67,500. If anybody from Revenue had only checked a computer, they could have seen what properties were making in that area and would have realised that the people should have been put in band one. That was representative of what happened the length and breadth of the country. The Government has made a dog's dinner out of this affair and upset many people. It is unjust and unfair and Sinn Féin is right to come in here tonight with this Private Members' motion because what the Government has done is a disgrace. It is incompetent.

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