Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for attending and for his response. I am delighted that he is considering this issue and that it is receiving attention. I hope he will take steps in the forthcoming Finance Bill to redress this matter. It was brought to my attention by the Standard Life shareholders. They are people, including people from the public sector, who made small investments with their redundancy payments, money they received, lump sums, etc. Due to the Celtic tiger and a number of changes made arising out of the troika's involvement, money became available for investment by small earners, people who would have worked all of their lives and believed their investments were secure. We are not referring to major investors, large sums of money or high flyers.

The Minister's explanation for the principle he established in providing tax relief to those Vodafone shareholders who lost out in a similar way does no justice to that principle. The underlying principle in this case is the same. The Minister stated, "The particular background to the Vodafone case is not a feature of the Standard Life return of value case." The circumstances are exactly the same. I cannot for the life of me see how he could make provision in the Finance Act 2014 yet not make similar provision acknowledging this matter. Doing so would not establish a new precedent, as it would be along the lines of what he Minister had already established.

I hope that An Post and the Royal Mail have learned their lesson. We need to tie down the traceability of all mail and the question of not incurring inordinate details. As to the question of tax relief and redress, though, that matter lies in the Minister's hands only. I hope he will be in a position come the budget and the Finance Bill to respond positively.

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