Results 121-140 of 6,295 for speaker:Michael D'Arcy

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: It is important to note I was discussing income tax. Of course everyone pays VAT, but about 30% of the 2.3 million people who work in Ireland do not pay any income tax. I support that wholeheartedly, because as I said to Senator Higgins earlier, we have a very progressive income tax system. It is the most progressive system within the OECD, though that is too often ignored by people with a...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: In case the Senator was unaware, when Fine Gael came back into government the first thing we did was to reverse Fianna Fáil's decision to reduce the minimum wage by €1.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: It is now €9.85, which is the second-highest minimum wage in Europe. The Senator has chosen to ignore that fact. We also have a social protection payment which used to be called the family income supplement, though I am not sure what it is called now.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: It is a superb payment.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: Many people benefit from getting a payment into a household on top of their net pay. It is a superb payment because it benefits so many families. It is a family income supplement. Many people find that they have to earn a huge amount more money in gross to get beyond the net effect of the family income supplement plus their net pay. The Senator should not decry that payment, as it is one...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: The Senator made a point about bad employers. I am not here to defend bad employers. Some sectors pay above the minimum wage because there are sectoral agreements in place for €10 an hour. The Senator should not say that the people paying those amounts-----

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: If the Senator will allow me to finish-----

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: The Senator should not say that those people are bad employers. I know both good employers and bad employers. Most employers do their best to continue employing people and the people doing the employing are often the last to be paid. That is how things are for many businesses, both big and small, the length and breadth of this country. The Senator should not decry employers because...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: It is very easy to stand up and decry a whole sector as bad employers but it is wrong to do so. I know huge numbers of people who work in the hospitality sector. They work in that sector to provide excellent employment. The Senator may not agree with it-----

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: -----but the hospitality sector employs tens of thousands of people and it is wrong for someone to stand up in a Chamber where he or she has privilege and call all those people bad employers. I am from a county with a huge amount of hospitality sector employers and employees.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: The Senator should not do that, because it is wrong. If he thinks certain companies are bad employers, he should go out onto the plinth and name them and see where he finds himself.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: Sinn Féin is always hypocritical when it comes to a wealth tax. The highest form of wealth in this State is property but Sinn Féin will not tax it because it is populist. That is purely what Sinn Féin is about.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: The point about VAT is that we brought the numbers back up to where they were. I am not sure whether Senator Mac Lochlainn knows how we paid for that in the first place. We did so by putting a levy on people's pension pots, which generated hundreds of millions and eventually billions of euro to provide the hospitality sector with a much needed boost. The industry was appreciative of the...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: Following a review, Revenue recently revised the threshold for high net worth individuals downwards from €50 million to €20 million. The review was conducted in the first quarter of 2019 and the report was published in June. The rationale for setting the threshold at €20 million included facilitating the close alignment of Revenue's resources with risk, the engagement...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: It was €50 million.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: No, €20 million was deemed appropriate.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: The Revenue Commissioners have just concluded a review. They are the people who deal with people of high net worth. They have made a judgment call based on their knowledge, experience and abilities in terms of the risk to be applied and how those high net worth people are configured with that figure. I am not going to tell the Revenue Commissioners what the figure should be. They are...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: The point I am making is that Revenue has just concluded a review and says that the appropriate figure is €20 million, not €10 million.

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (Resumed) (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: Capital allowances for intangible assets were introduced in the Finance Act 2009 to support the development of the knowledge economy and the provision of high-quality employment. This recognises the fact that growth in OECD economies is increasingly driven by investment in intangible assets. When the capital allowances were introduced, a restriction was provided to cap the amount of income...

Seanad: Finance Bill 2019: Committee Stage (Resumed) (3 Dec 2019)

Michael D'Arcy: The Finance Act 2016 introduced the IREF regime. The regime provides that profits arising to Irish funds from Irish property remain within the charge to Irish tax. An IREF is an investment undertaking where 25% or more of the value of the assets of the undertakings is derived from real estate assets in the State. As an investment undertaking, the profits or gains of the IREFs are generally...