Sheila Terry (Fine Gael)

I wish to raise the level of customs duty charged on gifts coming into Ireland from the US. I understand why duty is charged on goods bought by an Irish person from the US, but it is unacceptable for somebody in the US who sends a gift with a value of in excess of €45 to a family member in Ireland to be so charged. What can a person buy for €45 today? I bought clothes for my grandchildren in the US and posted them. They were the wrong size so they were returned to me to replace with clothes of the right size. They were valued at €200 but even though they were marked as gifts I was charged more than €50 to accept the returned goods. Customs officials were not to know that I had bought them in Ireland, sent them to the US and that they were returned, but I was told that any gift with a value of over €45 that comes into Ireland from the US is subject to customs duties. Many of us have friends and relatives living in the US who wish to send gifts to people in Ireland and do not know that customs duties will be levied on items over the value of €45. The Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources, Deputy Noel Dempsey, needs to review that situation. I do not know if the same rules apply to gifts from other countries — they probably do — but having endured the experience of receiving goods from the US I feel the threshold must be increased to an acceptable level.