Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 50:

In page 47, after line 35, to insert the following:“34.The Minister shall, within six months of the passing of this Act, prepare and lay before Dáil Éireann a report regarding the reduction in the qualifying period from 7 years to 4 years for the Capital Gains Tax exemption available under section 604A of the Tax Consolidation Act and the proposal to limit the reduction in the qualifying period to land only.”.

We discussed this on Committee Stage, and I bring forward the same amendment here. I have serious concern about what the Minister is doing with the seven year exemption on capital gains tax. Given the housing crisis, I am open to the idea in terms of land, and development land particularly, but I have serious concern that the Minister is now proposing to give a capital gains tax exemption for buildings, including multi-million euro hotels and office blocks bought in Dublin that were planned to be sold next year and will now not have to pay 33% capital gains tax on the uplift of the profits. That is why I have put down this amendment. I will not push it but I ask the Minister, his Department and the Revenue Commissioners especially to pay a close eye on this and monitor the tax foregone as a result of bringing forward this threshold on properties rather than land which has the potential to be developed.

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