I move:—
(1) That there shall be charged, levied, and paid on every bottle or jar of the capacity of five fluid ounces or more imported into Saorstát Eireann on or after the 26th day of April, 1928, and containing at the time of importation any dutiable commodity, a duty of customs at the rate of sixpence for every dozen or part of a dozen such bottles or jars.
(2) That Section 20 of the Finance Act, 1925 (No. 28 of 1925) shall be repealed as on and from the 26th day of April, 1928.
(3) It is hereby declared that it is expedient in the public interest that this resolution shall have statutory effect under the provisions of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act, 1927 (No. 7 of 1927).
The tax referred to in the previous resolution is a tax on empty bottles. Complaints were made that it was unfair to have a tax on empty bottles and to have no tax on full bottles, because as a matter of fact the result of that was that in certain cases the bottles and contents were being both imported where previously perhaps only the bottles would have been imported and filled here. We, therefore, imposed a duty on bottles containing dutiable commodities. We did not feel able, because of the number of articles that were involved, and the trouble that would have been caused, to impose it on all full bottles, but we imposed it on bottles containing dutiable ingredients. We imposed it in two steps —on bottles over five fluid ounces and on bottles under five fluid ounces. We now propose to exempt from duty empty bottles under five fluid ounces. Consequently, we will repeal the old duty, and impose a new duty simply on bottles that are of or over five fluid ounces.
