Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 19 November 2013
201. Deputy Alan Farrell asked the Minister for Finance if he will introduce tax provisions that complement the maintenance of old buildings, prevent demolition or encourage sponsorship and donation to heritage foundations; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49337/13]
View answerThere are a number of tax provisions already in the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997 (TCA) that provide reliefs and incentives to preserve and renovate built heritage.
Significant Buildings and Gardens
Section 482 of the TCA provides for tax relief for expenditure incurred on the repair, maintenance or restoration of approved buildings or gardens. For a building or garden to be approved it must be a building or garden which is intrinsically of significant scientific, historical, architectural or aesthetic interest, as determined by the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government. A garden may also be determined as being intrinsically of significant horticultural interest. The building or garden must be reasonably accessible to members of the public, as determined by the Revenue Commissioners.
Donations of Heritage Items
Section 1003 of the TCA provides tax relief of 80% of the market value for the donation of heritage items to certain approved bodies.
Donations of Heritage Property
Section 1003A of the TCA provides tax relief of 50% of the market value for the donation of heritage property to the Irish Heritage Trust or the Office of Public Works.
Tax Relief for Donations
Section 848A of the TCA provides for tax relief on donations to approved bodies. The list of approved bodies for the purposes of section 848A, which includes eligible charities, bodies approved for education in the arts and eligible primary, secondary and third level institutions, is available on the Revenue website at www.revenue.ie . The Irish Heritage Trust and the Heritage Council are two examples of heritage bodies that qualify for the relief.
Charitable Tax Exemption
In order to qualify for a charitable tax exemption, a body or trust must be established for charitable purposes only and must apply all of its income to those purposes. A list of bodies that have a charitable tax exemption is available on the Revenue Commissioners web site at the following link: http://www.revenue.ie/en/about/publications/charities_alpha.xls.
Living City Initiative
The Living City Initiative is a pilot project which was enacted in section 30 of Finance Act 2013 and was targeted initially at certain designated areas of Limerick and Waterford. Finance Act 2013 sets out the parameters of the scheme.
In my Budget speech on 15 October, I announced the extension of the Initiative to 4 other cities (Dublin, Cork, Galway and Kilkenny). As was the case with Limerick and Waterford, the Initiative will be targeted at certain designated neglected areas of these 4 cities – these designated areas will be agreed in conjunction with the relevant local authorities. It is not possible at this stage to say what streets will be included within a designated area, but it will not extend to an entire city. Finance Bill (no 2) 2013 also allows for certain amendments to the existing scheme to be made, including the eligibility date for buildings within these areas – now defined as “pre-1915”.
The Initiative is made up of a series of residential and retail tax incentives, the purpose of which is to try to break the spiral of urban depopulation and decay which afflicts many of our cities by encouraging families to return to live and work in these inner city centres.
An independent cost benefit analysis on the pilot project was published on my Department’s website on Budget day. An application for EU State Aid approval will be submitted shortly – it could not be submitted until the independent cost benefit analysis was received. It is not known how long the approval process will last but it can reasonably be expected to take several months.
