SIPTU: Top earners won’t be hit with higher taxes

TOP earners will not be hit with higher taxes under the new tax recommendations, the vice-president of SIPTU has warned.

The Commission on Taxation report, which recommends a range of new taxes, including a property tax, carbon taxes, water charges and the taxing of child benefit payments is, according to Brendan Hayes, “unfair”.

Mr Hayes, a member of the commission who declined to sign the final report because of “serious reservations”, said people earning more than €200,000 would not have to pay any more tax.

He said although this affected a relatively small number of people, a significant amount of money was involved.

Speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, Mr Hayes said the distribution of income in this country was “totally skewed”.

He said the way the tax commission’s proposals for a third tax band had been constructed meant a new tax band could fall between 20% and 41%, or below 20%, but no higher rate of tax could be introduced.

Mr Hayes, who wrote a letter to the commission, contained as an annex to the report, said if its recommendations were implemented they would not change our unfair society.

He said he believed couples earning about €70,000 would be the worst-hit.

“The State pretends to provide social infrastructure, and we pretend to pay for it,” he said.

“We need to ask what kind of society we want, what public services we want and are we prepared to pay the taxes to have them?”

Meanwhile, the director of Social Justice Ireland Fr Sean Healy, said there was “no justification” for the commission’s conclusion that the total tax-take should not rise.

“Eurostat, the European Union’s statistical body, states that a country is a low-tax economy if its total tax-take is below 35% of GDP. Ireland’s total-tax take is likely to be less than 29% of GDP in 2009.

“This is far below the Eurostat benchmark for a low-tax economy and is also far below the percentage of GDP that Ireland has taken in tax for many years,” he said.

“Social Justice Ireland believes that Ireland should remain a low-tax economy, but should set a target of 34.9% of GDP for total tax-take.

“This can be done without increasing income tax rates. A first step in the right direction would be to eliminate the tax breaks that litter Ireland’s tax system,” he added.