Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for taking this Topical Issue today. On 16 April, we enacted a very welcome amendment to the Valuation Act which gave partial relief or exemption from commercial rates to all sports clubs which had some commercial activity, be it a small bar or renting out some of their AstroTurfs. We did that because we recognised it was unfair to rate the entire club, which is a voluntary organisation and which is the backbone of probably all our communities, on the basis of it having a small bar or renting out its AstroTurf.

All politics is local so I wish to talk about my local GAA club which, historically, has had a commercial rates bill that is astronomical. It is off the wall and the club has not been able to afford it for the past number of years because the entire complex was rated. Our local council has taken four trustees of the club, who are very elderly men and who are only active in the club in a very recreational way these days, to court. They now have a judgment against them for this very large commercial rates bill and the council is pursuing them.

The reason I raise this with the Minister of State is because he directly manages, controls and directs our councils. I am asking him to intervene in this particular action and ask the council to look retrospectively at the commercial rates owed and, in the spirit in which the Valuation (Amendment) (No.2) Bill was passed on 16 April, to possibly recalculate the historic commercial rates and come to an amenable agreement so that four elderly men in Ratoath do not go to bed at night worrying about whether the courts will come after them for their houses. The GAA club in Ratoath wants to pay what is owed but it only wants to pay what is fair and what it can afford. Will the Minister of State intervene through his Department with local authorities, including Meath County Council, to find an amicable, fair and amenable outcome?

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