Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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35. To ask the Minister for Finance if he will change the requirement of local authorities to make a decision on the rate of local property tax by the end of September each year in advance of the local authorities receiving information regarding the other moneys that will be available to them from central government; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27592/16]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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Section 20 of the Finance (Local Property Tax) Act 2012 (as amended) allows a Local Authority to increase or decrease the basic rate of Local Property Tax (LPT) by up to 15% in respect of residential properties situated within their respective areas.

Regulations made in 2014 by the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government specify certain procedures that must be followed in relation to when and how a Local Authority can change the basic rate of LPT and the period for which the new rate can apply. Such procedures involve engaging in a public consultation and passing a special resolution at a meeting of the elected council members.

A Local Authority that has passed a special resolution to vary the rate of LPT must notify Revenue of its decision by 30 September (preceding year) to allow appropriate time to arrange timely implementation of the changes.  Any slippage in implementing the changes could result in incorrect notices issuing to property owners and/or incorrect phased payment mandates operating from the beginning of the due year.

To ensure all notifications and payment mandates are correctly calculated and issued on a timely basis, the latest date by which Revenue must complete the necessary adjustments is early October. This is the reason that the 30 September deadline in respect of the Local Authority notifications is so important for the efficient administration of LPT.

The scale of the task for Revenue in calculating varied rate changes for some Local Authorities while maintaining the basic rate for others within such a short period of time is very considerable. The task includes ensuring the calculations are correct for over 1.9 million properties, which includes issuing written notifications in respect of approximately 800,000 properties, ensuring correct deductions in respect of almost 360,000 Direct Debit mandates and 220,000 Deduction at Source salary or pension instructions and setting up correct mandates for almost 350,000 Single Debit Authority payments.

Given the scale of the LPT case base and the number of Local Authorities that exercise their right to vary the base rate each year (14 in 2015 and 11 in 2016), Revenue has confirmed that any further narrowing of the 30 September deadline would have adverse implications for the ongoing efficient administration of LPT.

At my request Dr Don Thornhill carried out a review of the operation of the Local Property Tax in 2015. Following the receipt of Dr Thornhill's report, a number of measures arising from the recommendations in the Report were implemented in the Finance (Local Property Tax) (Amendment) Act 2015, including the deferral of the revaluation process to 2019. My Department will be considering issues relating to the implementation of the remaining recommendations in Dr Thornhill's Report.  The issue raised by the Deputy can be considered further in that context.