Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Let me remind the Minister that at the time the property tax was brought in, the Minister justified it by saying there would be more money available for local services. Actually there has not been a cent more. The 25% cut in local government funding that preceded it was never replaced. We then had a property tax that reduced central Government funding on a euro-for-euro basis. We got no extra services for this but what we did get was an unfair tax. The Minister has simply not addressed the issue of unaffordability and the regressive nature of the tax.

My proposal to the Minister is what we proposed in our pre-budget submission that the local property tax should be abolished for principal private dwellings and replaced with a landlord's tax. In other words, we should tax second, third, fourth or fifth properties and people who own property that is simply wealth and not the roof over their head. The Government could replace one with the other. That would be a genuine wealth tax which would not hit people on low incomes.

See this speech in context