Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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To ask the Minister for Finance if he will provide a report on all new tax reliefs provided for in budget 2012 including the number of persons or companies who have availed of each tax relief; the total amount of relief awarded under each relief; and the number of jobs that have been directly created as a result of each relief. [42262/12]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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In relation to costs, the estimated full year costs and/or yields of the tax revenue measures introduced in Budget 2012 are set out on pages B5 – B 11 of the Summary of 2012 Budget and Estimates Measures Policy Changes section of the Budget 2012 book. To enable meaningful evaluation to take place, the reliefs need to have been in place for some period of time. As 2012 is the earliest year in which the changes can take effect, information on the take-up of these tax reliefs will not be available until appropriate tax returns for 2012 are provided to the Revenue Commissioners.

The analysis of tax reliefs or expenditures was considered by the Commission on Taxation. The Commission was of the opinion that tax expenditures should be the subject of ongoing evaluation and appropriate and timely cost benefit analysis. This is to ensure that they are both economically efficient and that parliamentary oversight can be well informed. I would generally agree with the view of the Commission but regard has to be had to the principle of proportionality in relation to any analysis. In other words, the level of resources invested in carrying out the analysis should be commensurate with the scale of the expenditure involved and of course sufficient time is needed to undertake the analysis required.

Finally, I would advise the Deputy that all tax reliefs are kept under review and form part of the Tax Strategy Group’s (TSG) discussions in advance of the Budget. The TSG papers are subsequently published on the Department of Finance’s tax policy website: www.taxpolicy.gov.ie.