The Local Government (Charges) Act 2009, as amended, provides the legislative basis for the Non-Principal Private Residence Charge. The NPPR Charge, which has since been discontinued, applied in the years 2009 to 2013 to any residential property in which the owner did not reside as their normal place of residence. The self-assessed charge is set at €200 per annum. It is a matter for an owner to determine if he or she has a liability and, if so, to declare that liability and pay the Charge and any late payment fees applicable. Under the Act, it is a function of a local authority to collect Non-Principal Private Residence Charges and late payment fees due to it and all Charges and late payment fees imposed and payable to a local authority are under the care and management of the local authority concerned.
The Non-Principal Private Residence Charge has raised in excess of €447.8m to date over its five years of operation. Proceeds from the charge are retained by local authorities and are used for the provision of local services. It is not possible to state with any certainty the level of non-compliance with the Charge. However, I am confident that compliance levels are high as a result of data matching undertaken with other public bodies, such as the Private Residential Tenancies Board and the Revenue Commissioners, as provided for under the Act. Table 1 below details Non-Principal Private Residence Charge revenue collected for each local authority and is set out by liability date; it has been completed based on data provided by the Local Government Management Agency.
Local authorities are under a statutory obligation to levy rates on any property used for commercial purposes in accordance with the details entered in the valuation lists prepared by the independent Commissioner for Valuation under the Valuation Act 2001. As with all local charges, the invoicing and collection of amounts due is a matter for the local authority concerned to manage in light of prevailing circumstances and in accordance with normal accountancy procedures. Tables 2 and 3 below detail the amounts of commercial rates expected to be collected and the amounts actually collected as reported by local authorities in their individual audited financial statements. The latest audited information that is available relates to the financial year 2012. As a matter of course, every local authority publishes its audited annual financial statement and a variety of related financial information on their individual websites.