Vol. 205 No. 12
asked the Minister for Finance what action the Government propose to take to compensate pensioners, retired persons and those living on fixed incomes for the steep rise which has occurred in the cost of living owing to the introduction of the turnover tax; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
33.
asked the Minister for Finance whether he has taken into consideration the feelings of resentment created by the working of the turnover tax, as evidenced by the large public demonstration of women in Dublin on Thursday, 14th November; and if, arising therefrom, he will now state what steps he proposes to take to compensate housewives, widows and old age pensioners for the increase in cost of living created by the tax.
34.
asked the Minister for Finance the estimated return in a full year from the turnover tax; and the effect of its abolition on national policy, the public services and on the prospect of further social benefits, and increases for State pensioners and employees.
I propose, with the permission of the Ceann Comhairle, to take Questions Nos. 32, 33 and 34 together.
The Budget estimate of the full year yield from the turnover tax was £10½ million and the cost in a full year of the compensatory social welfare reliefs £4¾ million. This year the net yield from the tax, when allowance is made for the social welfare reliefs, is estimated at £1½ million.
The compensatory reliefs granted in the Budget were the maximum that could be afforded having regard to the Exchequer position this year. The extent to which further compensatory measures may be desirable and practicable will require consideration in the light of the Budget position next year. I cannot, of course, anticipate what next year's Budget may, or may not, contain.
In the absence of the turnover tax, the increased expenditure this year on social and economic development could not have been undertaken, there would have been insufficient revenue to finance the public services and, looking to the future, it could have happened that desirable improvements in the social and economic services which were within the country's means could not be financed because the revenue system was lacking in the means to reflect fully the increase in national prosperity.
Is it not a fact that the increases in social welfare benefits which have been granted and which apply only to limited sections are on the basis of the 2½ per cent turnover tax, whereas in fact the tax varies from five per cent to 25 per cent?
No, they are granted on a much higher basis. The 2/6 on the old age pension is more like 7½ per cent or eight per cent. They vary but they all more than cover 2½ per cent.
The increase is anything from five per cent to 25 per cent.
Is the Minister seriously considering that the miserable increases in old age pensions and in the social welfare payments given in the Budget compensate for the tremendous increase in the cost of living which has been experienced in the city?
I am saying that they more than compensate and I am much more serious than the Deputy because I provided for the payment of them.
The Minister said the Budget estimate of revenue was £10½ million. Has the Minister any reason to change that figure in any way now?
Naturally, I would not be in a position to revise that figure until the first few months' receipts come in.
Is the Minister aware that Deputy Corish voted against these increases?
Sit down, you big stiff.
I am well aware of it.
The RDS Bull Show is over.
I take it that the Minister has no reason to vary his figure of £10½ million?
Could the Minister tell us if the figure of £10 million is based on the figures that obtained last April or on the figures obtaining at the end of October?
They were based on an anticipated increase in the national income. I am glad to say that increase has taken place so far.
One final question: will the Minister see the women tomorrow?
I shall leave them to the Deputy.
They will be here.
35.
asked the Minister for Finance if he will give a complete list of the items exempted by him by order from the turnover tax.
With the permission of the Ceann Comhairle, I propose to circulate with the Official Report a list of the sales and other activities which I have exempted from the turnover tax by Orders under subsection (2) of Section 48 of the Finance Act, 1963. These Order relate to activities carried on within the State. I have in addition made an Order under subsection (2) of Section 64 of the Act with the object of exempting as far as practicable imports of goods which are exempt on sale within the State. Since the items covered by the Import Order are largely the same as those set out in the list circulated I have not dealt with them separately. I would point out, however, that all the Orders in question, with explanatory notes attached, have been placed on the Table of the House in accordance with the usual procedure and are available in the Library and are on sale in the Government Publications Sale Office.
Following is the list:—
TURNOVER TAX.
List of Exempted Sales and Activities.
Funeral undertaking.
The issue of tickets or coupons issued for the purposes of a lottery.
The acceptance of bets at a coursing meeting in relation to courses run at that meeting.
Sales of asphalt, bitumen, pitch and tar in the form in which those substances are commonly supplied for the construction of roads.
Sales of articles of steel or aluminium of a kind commonly used in the construction of buildings (including haybarns, harbours, bridges and roads) which are angles, tees, joists, channels, bars (square, rectangular or round), tubes, plates and wire, in the form of beams, joists, stanchions, trusses, purlins, stays, bases, stiffeners, frames and reinforcement, whether fabricated or assembled or not, including shuttering, curtain walling, piling and scaffolding, and the fittings, bolts, nuts and rivets used in the assembly thereof, but not including door or window frames (other than curtain walling), doors, partitioning or other internal fittings.
Sales of articles (other than hand tools) of any of the following descriptions, namely:—
Lifting, handling, loading or unloading machinery, telphers and conveyors (for example, lifts, hoists, winches, cranes, transporter cranes, jacks, pulley tackle, belt conveyors and teleferics).
Excavating, levelling, boring and extracting machinery, stationary or mobile, for earth, minerals or ores (for example, mechanical shovels, coalcutters, excavators, scrapers, levellers and bulldozers); pile-drivers and extractors.
Air compressors.
Machines designed, constructed and intended for use in manufacturing, processing, spreading and finishing asphalt, bitumen, tar, tarmacadam, concrete and mortar (including concrete blocks and beams).
Motor vehicles designed, constructed and intended for the transport of goods or materials.
Works trucks, mechanically propelled, of the types used in factories or warehouses for short distance transport or handling of goods.
Tractors.
Machine-tools for working wood, metal, metallic carbides, stone, ceramics, concrete, asbestos - cement and like mineral materials, or for working glass in the cold.
Electrical generating sets other than generating sets for use in cycles, motor vehicles, domestic appliances, or hand tools.
Internal combustion piston engines other than those capable of being used in motor vehicles designed for the carriage of persons by road.
Stationary engines.
Road rollers.
Machinery for sorting, screening, separating, washing, crushing, grinding or mixing earth, stone, ores or other mineral substances.
Pumps for pumping water, sludge and concrete.
Steam and other vapour generating boilers.
Trailers designed for traction by a mechanically propelled vehicle, including semi-trailers for articulated motor vehicles, but not including caravans.
Equipment, tools and parts which are specially designed for use with any of the articles specified above and are not normally used for any other purpose.
Sales of articles of any of the following descriptions:—
Railway and tramway locomotives, rolling stock, and parts thereof; railway and tramway track fixtures, traffic signalling equipment of all kinds (including fog signals).
Railway wood sleepers.
Railway and tramway track construction material of iron or steel; rails, check-rails, switch blades, crossings (or frogs), crossing pieces, point rods, rack rails, sleepers, fishplates, chairs, chair wedges, sole plates, rail chips, bedplates and ties.
Sales of water by local authorities.
The letting on hire of any article the sale of which is mentioned as an exempted activity in the First Schedule to the Finance Act, 1963, or is declared by the Minister for Finance by order to be an exempted activity for the purposes of subsection (2) of Section 48 of that Act.
Sales, other than sales of hydrocarbon oils for road transport or sales of motor vehicles designed for the conveyance of persons by road, to bodies corporate which establish to the satisfaction of the Revenue Commissioners that their main activity consists of the transport of passengers or goods outside the State or the maintenance of lightships or lighthouses.
36.
asked the Minister for Finance whether the 2½ per cent turnover tax is payable on goods sold at the Shannon Free Airport.
Turnover tax is not payable on goods sold in the Shannon Free Airport to persons leaving the State. Tax is payable on all other sales for personal use or consumption.
37.
asked the Minister for Finance whether, in view of the non-commercial nature of the work carried out by the Irish Lifeboat Institution which is maintained solely by voluntary subscription, and in view of the fact that the Commissioners of Irish Lights have been granted exemption from the turnover tax, he will now grant such an exemption on items purchased by the Institution.
The existing law exempts from turnover tax sales within the State of plant, machinery, equipment and other materials and substances of a kind in general use by fishermen for the purposes of their occupation. It is clear from correspondence with the Lifeboat Institution that the great bulk of their purchases within the State will be exempt from tax by reference to that exemption, and there appears to be no need for a special exemption for them in that regard.
I have under consideration at present the question of exempting from the turnover tax imports into the State of equipment used by fishermen and I will bear in mind in that connection the special representations which have been made in regard to imports by the Institution.
I am sure the Minister will try to ensure that the facilities available to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution will be somewhat similar to those accorded to the Commissioners of Irish Lights?
The exemptions will apply in a similar way, in so far as we give exemptions to fishermen.
There is a little more needed here.
We will watch that.
