Vol. 486 No. 2
119 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for Finance if he will make a statement on recent revelations that the Revenue Commissioners' efforts to apprehend serious tax evaders are being hampered by the refusal of his Department to sanction the employment of a solicitor to handle prosecutions. [1190/98]
The Deputy is, no doubt, referring to the recent examination of the Committee of Public Accounts of the 1996 report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and the appropriation accounts of the Revenue Commissioners where the question of the staffing resources in the revenue solicitor's office was raised. The problem has since been resolved.
The question at issue as far as my Department was concerned was the upgrading of a senior post in the revenue solicitor's office concerned with prosecutions for tax fraud. The Revenue Commissioners do not maintain that the prosecution process had been hampered because there were not enough solicitors in the office. The solution agreed involved the upgrading sought and the redeployment into the office of an extra post within Revenue's staff ceiling.
