Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I do not want to go down a rabbit hole of arguing with the Minister of State about the significance of the property tax. He says people's homes are the biggest form of wealth but for many it is a struggle to keep the roof over their head, pay the mortgage, etc. Putting the property tax on those who can ill-afford it is obscene. However, that is not what I am here to argue.

The Minister of State is evading my question on tax on wealth in this country because it is not directly in the Oxfam report. However, using the method that report applies, the first thing it points out is that the wealth of the top tier of society has increased hugely in Ireland. Nine billionaires have seen their wealth increase by €18 billion since the start of the pandemic to an obscene figure of €50 billion. We know we do not get back what we should in tax from that. The method Oxfam advocates allows for an exemption of up to €4 million, which I think is way too high but I use that figure to show how modest the report is. If we take that exemption rate, after that we could introduce a serious wealth tax that would bring in the money we need to deal with the various crises we face.

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