Marie Sherlock (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his reply but I am disappointed by it. I believe the goalposts have been shifted since Committee Stage, when Senators were told that people would be horrified to discover that they would not be able to offset some of their tax liability for the PUP against their personal and PAYE tax credits. The recommendation clearly attempts to deal with that by separating the period before 5 August from the period after 5 August. The Minister of State has made his point. Obviously, I have not won the argument. However, I will take a positive from this because, to my mind, this is breaking new ground. It acknowledges that it is possible to introduce a payment or tax change and then retrospectively change its status several months later. I look forward to the Government being open to the concept of retrospective application of changes when we are debating issues relating to other parts of the tax code. Up to now, it has not been open to that. I will take it from section 3 that the Government is willing to countenance retrospective application into the future. Even if it is not welcome in the context of income tax, it will certainly be very welcome in other areas of the tax code.