Rose Conway Walsh (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I wrote it after spending the day speaking to constituents who are suffering under this Government. It is important that they have a voice here. We ask people to carry the burden time and time again and tell them that we will see what can be done next year. The Government says it will do this when the people return it to power with its ever-compliant partners, Fianna Fáil. Fine Gael has told the people often enough that it is the responsible party and that it knows everything there is to know about economics. Indeed, it wants people to believe they have no alternative but to keep it in the position to which it has become accustomed and to keep returning it to power.

We will discuss the detail of the Bill on Committee Stage next week, so today I just want to cover a few aspects of how I believe the Government has failed to give ordinary workers and families a break despite us being the fastest growing economy in Europe. Brexit is an issue and it does present problems and challenges but we are still the fastest growing economy in Europe.

First, let us look at the carbon tax levied on households and drivers who can least afford it and on those of us living in rural Ireland. Since 2010, we have paid €3.35 billion in carbon tax. Last year alone, the Government collected €435 million. None of this has been ring-fenced for climate action measures. I welcome what the Minister of State said about ring-fencing €90 million this year but, in all of the time it has existed, this tax has failed to reduce emissions. Increasing the carbon tax will not do so either. Britain does not have a carbon tax yet its emissions have decreased. The Government says that it wants to change behaviour but it does not provide the alternatives in public transport, renewable energy or proper investment in rural Ireland.

Now let us compare the extension of tax breaks for multinational executives with the treatment of average paid workers and farmers. SARP is a little-known scheme that enables wealthy executives to write off one third of their salary against income tax. This means a multinational executive who moves to Dublin on a salary of €1 million per annum can avoid more than €123,000 in tax, which anybody else would have to pay. This is in contrast to a small farmer whose payments are delayed due to a computer glitch and run over into the new year. Not only is he under severe financial stress as result of not being able to pay his bills, he is taxed on two payments within one financial year. This means his tax liability is increased through no fault of his own. There is no SARP for him or his family. He will be worse off while someone earning €1 million will be better off by €123,000. Where is the tax justice in that? Where is the fairness?

Other workers will have to pay tax of 40% on their salary above the standard rate band while these multimillionaire executives will pay tax of 28% above the standard rate of tax. It really does not make sense. Based on the cost of this tax break in recent years, it is likely to cost the Irish people €100 million next year. We could have increased the number of apprenticeships by 5,000 at a cost of €35.8 million. We could have cleared the home help waiting lists entirely for €59 million. We could have reinstated the rehabilitative training allowance, which was cruelly taken away from people with disabilities who are trying to access training and education, for a cost of just €37 million. We still would have had €1.5 million left over. The choice was whether to give more to millionaire executives or to create equality of opportunity and protect the vulnerable. This Government, ably assisted by Fianna Fáil, chose those to whom they are closest, those who have the most.

Despite all of the expert advice on another measure, the Government and Fianna Fáil have decided to extend the help-to-buy scheme for another two years under section 15 at a cost of another €100 million in 2020 alone. That is €40 million more than was allocated for additional social housing. More than one fifth of houses that were bought through this scheme were bought at a cost of more than €375,000. Worse still, 40% of the people who availed of this tax break had the 10% deposit needed to get the mortgage to buy the house. That 40% equates to €40 million that was handed out to people who did not need it to get a deposit to buy a house and yet Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil think that money is better spent in their pockets than it would have been spent in reaching out to people who do not know where they will sleep this Christmas. It is wrong on so many levels. This is not an affordable housing scheme no matter what way it is wrapped up. The report by the Parliamentary Budget Office made it quite clear that it has done nothing to reduce house prices and has failed to help low and middle-income earners onto the property ladder.

I welcome the move in the Bill to heed Sinn Féin's calls to tackle the serious tax avoidance among property investors through REITs and IREFs, particularly the provisions of section 28 which seem to close the re-evaluation loophole that was present upon REIT cessation by requiring that the relevant REIT must be in operation for over 15 years before enjoying preferential treatment. However, there should not be a capital gains tax exemption even if a REIT is in operation after 15 years. If these properties are sold to a company after that time, the REIT should still not avail of a capital gains tax exemption. Section 60 seems to close the tax loophole on stamp duty that has existed for investors for far too long despite Sinn Féin's insistence that it be closed.

The provisions of this Bill do not go far enough. Property investors have for too long been allowed to aggressively invest in property and avoid serious tax payments. They should be subject to the new 7.5% rate of commercial stamp duty just like everybody else. If somebody buys a local shop in Belmullet or Ballina, he or she has to pay 7.5% stamp duty, while others are exempt.

On Committee Stage, I will examine in detail some of the opportunities to give workers and families a badly-needed break, which have now been lost. An awful lot of people, including myself, are disappointed with this Bill. People are struggling, every week and every month, just to exist. It should not be like that when we are the fastest growing economy in Europe.