John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The amendments Deputy Dowds and I tabled were ruled out of order, as they would potentially be a charge on the State. We knew that could happen. They deal with the funding of local government and changes to the collection of rates, in particular. We are not too upset about that because the Minister and his officials have to a great extent worked with us to deal with those amendments in their own way and have put their own wording on those issues.

We greatly appreciate the kind of communication there has been in that regard in the past few months. It has been very constructive. We both feel that way. I hope that the Minister will tell me his view about spreading the payments when it comes to new valuations as set down in our amendment.

There is a two-tier economy in this country. Certain parts of the country are being revalued. It started in Dublin then Limerick and now Waterford. In many cases the increases on the rates bill for some businesses are as large as 200% or 300%. There is a simple idea behind my amendment, to spread the payments over three years, to allow people to manage the increases. We spotted something in the Bill which we thought was important. There is a policy contradiction. Somebody in the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government had the foresight to examine the harmonisation process that occurs when local authorities are amalgamated and felt that it would be wise not to inflict a sharp shock on businesses but to spread that harmonisation process over 10 years. For a business within a local authority area that is being amalgamated with another local authority the harmonisation process would be spread out so that it would have a minimal effect on the business. A 300% increase in a new valuation for a business is potentially disastrous and catastrophic for the business.

We thank the officials in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform for their technical help. We propose to spread the payments at least over three years. That has a downside: this is budget neutral and there will be people who are subject to decreases, which must be spread out like the increases. I am less concerned about that than I am about the people who would have to suffer the increase so quickly in one year. That is a real problem. I would appreciate if the Minister could address our amendment, which was ruled out of order on Committee Stage and again here. I know that he is considering it and talking to his officials about it, as well as dealing with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform.

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