Revenue nets €420m from tax dodgers

THE Revenue Commissioners have netted over €420 million from tax cheats so far this year.

New figures from the Revenue show it collected €170m from those who evaded income tax or held undeclared assets in the three months to the end of September.

Included are settlements worth €31.5m from individuals and companies who were named and shamed.

The largest settlement was for €2.74m from Wicklow businessman Anthony Fogarty.

He paid interest and penalties of €1.8m for underdeclaring his income tax liability and for hiding untaxed offshore assets from the Revenue.

Mr Fogarty’s business, the Arklow-based hardware merchants P Boland, made a settlement of €2.2m forunderdeclaring PAYE and PRSI. The payment followed an audit of the company by the Revenue Commissions.

The settlement is one of the largest-ever reached with the Revenue.

Also on the latest list of tax defaulters is a €542,421 settlement with the late property developer Phil Monahan. His company, Monarch Properties, has been investigated by the Planning Tribunal in relation to alleged corruption surrounding the rezoning of its land at Cherrywood in south Dublin.

There were other multi- millionaire settlements reached. Peter Sweeney, a farmer from Newcastle, Co Dublin, paid out €1.2m for tax evasion scams.

Another farmer, Fredderick Shekleton, from Drumconrath, Navan, Co Meath, paid over almost €1.5m.

Thomas Carroll, a retired optician from Dublin, agreed a €1.71m settlement for not paying enough income tax and for illegal offshore assets.

Patrick Mann, from Tralee, Co Kerry, the solicitor for Joanna Hayes — the woman at the centre of the Kerry babies case — made a settlement for €244,581 for underdeclaring income tax, VAT and for putting untaxed assets through a single premium insurance policies.

Joan Williams, the former secretary to Des Traynor (who acted as personal banker to former Taoiseach Charles Haughey), paid out €120,000.

The Revenue said that of the 141 settlements between June and September:

* 25 settlements totalling €6.97m relate to bogus non-resident bank account holders.

* Four settlements totalling €1.35m relate to the Revenue’s Ansbacher Bank investigations.

* 25 settlements totalling €11.03m were from investigations into offshore funds.

* 26 settlements totalling €3.53m arose from Revenue’s single premium insurance product investigation.