Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I move:

That leave be granted to introduce a Bill entitled an Act to amend the Valuation Act 2001 to make provision whereby all sports clubs and sporting organisations shall only be liable to be charged property rates on that part of the premises of the sports club or organisation which is licenced to sell alcoholic beverages and to provide for related matters.

The purpose of the Bill is to address an anomaly in the existing valuation legislation whereby sporting clubs and organisations with licensed premises are being charged for the entire property in which they stand rather than for the area of the licensed premises, as should apply. It is one of a number of changes we propose to bring forward to amend the existing valuation legislation, which Government promised to overhaul due to its archaic nature and so forth, but unfortunately there has been nothing forthcoming in that regard. We hope this will be the first of a series of measures by which we would address those issues.

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