Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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127. To ask the Minister for Finance the estimated cost of increasing the standard fund threshold by €100,000, €500,000 and €1 million respectively, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [37864/24]

Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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The Standard Fund Threshold (SFT) is the maximum allowable pension fund on retirement for tax purposes which was introduced in Budget and Finance Act 2006 to prevent over-funding of pensions through tax-relieved arrangements.

I am informed by Revenue that they are unable to provide a costing for changes to the SFT. Information on the numbers and values of individual pension funds or on individual accrued benefits in pension schemes are not generally required to be supplied to Revenue. Therefore, currently there is no readily available underlying data or methodology on which to base reliable estimates of any possible costs increases in the Standard Fund Threshold as outlined by the Deputy.

As the Deputy will be aware, the examination of the Standard Fund Threshold has recently concluded and in the context of this examination my officials are examining the issue of estimating the indicative costs of changes to the SFT, using the available information about previous payments of Chargeable Excess Tax (CET). I hope to be in a position to share this information shortly.