Mary Upton (Dublin South Central, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Question 439: To ask the Minister for Social Protection the discussions he has had with the Department of Tourism, Culture and Sport and the Department of Finance regarding the issue of artists who are required to be declared as self employed to avail of the artists tax exemption in view of the fact that this may affect their claim for social welfare; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27238/10]

Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Section 195 of the Taxes Consolidation Act, 1997 empowers the Revenue Commissioners to make a determination that certain artistic works are original and creative works generally recognised as having cultural or artistic merit. Earnings derived from such works are exempt from income tax from the year in which the claim was made. The scheme provides that the Revenue Commissioners can make determinations in respect of artistic works in the following categories only: 1. a book or other writing; 2. a play; 3. a musical composition; 4. a painting or other like picture, and 5. a sculpture.

In relation to social insurance, legislation provides that workers are insured as either employees or self-employed contributions. Employees are those who are in employment under a contract of service. It is also provided that those who were not under a contract of service but have reckonable emoluments or reckonable income, as defined, are insurable as self-employed contributors.

The range of benefits and pensions to which different groups of workers may establish entitlement reflects the risks associated with the nature of their work. This in turn reflects the rate of contribution payable. Artists are generally adjudged to be self-employed workers, liable for PRSI at the Class S rate of 3%. They are consequently eligible for a narrower range of benefits than general employees who, together with their employers, pay a total social insurance contribution of 14.75%, excluding levies, under the full-rate PRSI Class A.

Self-employed workers are not insured against short-term benefits such as illness and jobseeker's payments – these are only available to persons covered by PRSI Classes A, E, H and P. This reflects the need for coverage for various contingencies, the rate of contributions that self-employed persons pay, the practicalities of administering and controlling access to short-term payments and the annualised system of contributions that these same persons enjoy. A system of separate arrangements for employed and self-employed workers within a social insurance context is common in other European social protection systems.

Self-employed workers who do not qualify for an insurance-based benefit may establish entitlement to assistance-based payments by satisfying certain conditions including a means test. There are no plans to alter the arrangements outlined above.