asked the Minister for Finance if he is aware that the Amalgamated Engineering Union, the headquarters of which are in London, has a Superannuation Reserve Fund for the purpose of facilitating its members in the purchase of houses; that this Fund from which loans are advanced for the purchase of houses is acknowledged by the English Inland Revenue Authorities as a Benevolent Fund and is therefore not chargeable for income tax; whether in the interests of citizens of the Saorstát who are members of this Union and who have contributed to the said Reserve Fund through its Irish branches, and who are deprived of securing loans for house purchasing owing to income tax difficulties with the Saorstát Revenue Commissioners he will introduce proposals for legislation to exempt borrowers in the Saorstát, in repaying loans, from being charged income tax on the interest paid each year.
CEIST—QUESTION. ORAL ANSWER. - INCOME TAX ON ENGINEERING UNION'S FUNDS.
The income tax difficulties are not specified; but I take it that the question arises out of the deduction of income tax authorised to be made by a person paying interest on a loan. In paying such interest the borrower deducts the income tax appropriate to the interest, and thereby recoups himself for the amount for which he is accountable to the Revenue. The lender receives the interest less income tax; and if, as is presumed to be the case in regard to the Amalgamated Engineering Union, he can prove that he is a person who is resident in Great Britain and not resident in the Saorstát, he will be entitled to repayment of any Saorstát Eireann income tax deducted for 1926/27 and subsequent years, so long as the Double Taxation agreement confirmed by the Finance Act, 1926, has statutory effect.