Michael D'Arcy (Fine Gael)

On that issue, yesterday I stated that we have a difficulty in this State because our cost base is too high. One area in particular where the cost base is too high is hairdressing. The problem has more to do with the black market rather than the green economy. The black market economy provides nothing for the State. It deals in cash. The cash goes into somebody's pocket and the State gets no opportunity to gain merit from that activity via VAT. Deputy Byrne asked about hairdressing. There is an industry in this area where people with the skills visit people in their homes and get paid money which goes into their back pockets. The State sees no portion of that. What we need to do, as suggested by Senators Byrne and Walsh, is to reduce costs. If we do not reduce our costs, we will lose more jobs. Members want to know how many jobs will be created by this measure. We cannot say for certain, but we know how many jobs those industries have lost in the past two or three years - 25% of them. That is a significant number of jobs. We do not know what number of jobs will be created over the next three to four years, but we must arrest the decline.

I did not comment on section 1 as I did not want to move outside the scope of the debate, but I ask the Cathaoirleach to allow me comment now. Several years ago, the then Minister for Finance, Mr. Charlie McCreevy, reduced capital gains tax from 40% to 20%, without at that stage being able to quantify the impact that would have on the market. However, when the decision was made, capital gains tax returns increased significantly. There are, therefore, methods the Government can find to be proactive. This is what the Government is doing with this Bill.