Coalition has to defuse property tax bomb

Constructing and implementing an austerity property tax at the height of the slump may have been brave. 

But many analysts believe that the Coalition will fail the next test: reforming the property tax before the election without falling victim to populist temptations to freeze the tax.

There is no doubt that the property tax needs huge surgery. The people who built the structures of the tax never thought that Irish house prices would recover from their slump so quickly. Property tax bills were assessed on a three-year cycle for the first time on home price values in May 2013.