Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his reply. The figures he has given outline the problem with the local property tax. It is not what people thought it was and what it was for. The Minister has outlined that €281 million was disbursed from the local government fund in respect of general purpose payments while a further €359 million was also disbursed from the fund. As we all know, the fund is made up motor tax, direct Exchequer funding from other sources and the local property tax. In 2014, the fund totalled €1.626 billion. For that year some €281 million was disbursed from the fund in respect of general purpose payments while miscellaneous provisions amounting to €47 million, €21 million and another €6 million, totalling €74 million, were also disbursed from the fund. This means that approximately €350 million was disbursed from the fund. However, this shows a huge discrepancy, not just in respect of the local property tax money, which shows there is €100 million which did not go into the fund. It also shows that more than €1 billion from the fund was disbursed in other ways.

This is the issue. We were told in the mid-1990s that the local government fund would be made up of the road tax. The road tax was increased and we now pay higher road tax than our neighbouring states. It is much higher here than in the North, which the Government often references. We do not have any control over this as the tax in the North is set by the British Government.

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