The public should not panic about the proposals in the Commission for Taxation report or the McCarthy report, Minister for Social Welfare Mary Hanafin said in Cork yesterday.

The SIPTU representative who sat on the Commission for Taxation has described the body's proposals on tax reform as "unfair".

THE art of taxation was compared by the finance minister of King Louis XIV to plucking a goose: the aim is to get the most feathers with the smallest possible amount of hissing.

The Commission for Taxation is reportedly recommending that the overall household tax burden not be increased any further in this December's budget.

THE Cabinet yesterday discussed Colm McCarthy’s An Bord Snip Nua’s suggestions on how we can try to save this country from bankruptcy. It must have been a chastening experience for most ministers, especially those who have dedicated the last decades of their lives to trying to realise their vision of a brighter, better Ireland.

THE carbon tax favoured by junior Government partners the Green party would likely result in poorer households having to pay more for heating, a Government advisory group has acknowledged.

ENVIRONMENT Minister John Gormley yesterday delivered the first carbon budget in the history of the State — the first of its kind in Western Europe — claiming it marked the moment climate change moved to the heart of government.

IT WASN’T very dramatic in the end — after all carbon emissions are as exciting as double physics on a Monday morning in January — but yesterday was the day when the Green Party justified itself in government.