Gay Mitchell (Dublin South Central, Fine Gael)
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Question 84: To ask the Minister for Finance the estimated tax take from domestic rental accommodation income in 2002, 2003 and 2004; and his estimate of the comparable tax take for the same years for Dublin city. [11574/05]

Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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I am informed by the Revenue Commissioners that the latest relevant information currently available is based on income tax returns filed for the income tax years ending 5 April 2000, 5 April 2001 and the short tax year ending 31 December 2001. This is set out as follows:

The rental income could come from either private tenants or business tenants. Data is not available to distinguish between income from private rental accommodation and from other accommodation. An estimated breakdown of the figures on a geographical basis is available on the basis of bailiwick which means, in this case, the jurisdiction or boundaries within which Revenue sheriffs, county registrars or their officers operate for the purposes of enforcement of tax debt. It equates geographically with counties while also providing separate breakdowns for city and county in the case of County Dublin and County Cork.

In considering the data it should be borne in mind that the allocation by city or county of PAYE employees is somewhat misleading because it has been the practice to associate each employee with the city or county in which his or her employer is registered for PAYE purposes, regardless of the address of the actual workplace or of the individual's home address. Self-employed persons are associated on the tax record with the address at which the business is located, which may be in a different city or county to the home address. Similarly, companies are associated on the tax record with the county address of the head office or branch with which contact is established for tax purposes, which may be different to the city or county addresses of other branches.

It should be noted that, as PAYE taxpayers were charged tax on their earnings in the period from 6 April to 31 December 2001 and self-employed taxpayers were assessed to tax for the short "year" on 74% of the profits earned in a 12 month accounting period, the figures will not be directly comparable with those of earlier years.