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

For many years, People Before Profit has called for a wealth tax to try to redistribute wealth in what is one of the richest countries in the world where wealth has increased exponentially year after year, including during the pandemic. We now have the ironic situation that today, 100 of the richest people in the world have sent a begging letter to the political leaders of the world asking if the leaders will please tax them more because they are not being taxed enough, and to introduce wealth taxes. Even the billionaires see the gross inequality and pleaded with political leaders at Davos to tax them more. However, the Government resisted and tried to rubbish what Oxfam said this week.

For the Taoiseach's information or that of the officials who wrote his earlier response, the Central Bank quarterly report every single year spells out the amount of personal, financial and household wealth in this country and shows increases in that wealth in exactly the same proportions that Oxfam is outlining. The Department of Finance did a study, and the Taoiseach is right to say there are no studies, although there should be, which I think is deliberate, of the distribution of that wealth. The Department of Finance did a distribution study in 2017, however, which showed the richest 10% in this country have 53% of that wealth whereas the poorest 50% have less than 2% of the wealth. If we are going to address inequality and have the money for housing, health and education, surely we could impose a little bit of additional tax on the super-wealthy millionaires and billionaires.

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