Talks begin on minimum wage and mortgage relief

NEGOTIATIONS will begin in earnest today with the EU and IMF on restoring the minimum wage, cutting the lower VAT rate and increasing mortgage interest relief for first-time buyers.

The Government must show how they intend to pay for the changes by cutting in other areas or raising more in taxes to ensure that the bottom line of the austerity agreed with the EU/IMF remains the same.

Suggestions from officials in the Department of Finance, as revealed in the Irish Examiner on Saturday, included scrapping the zero VAT rate for food, oral medicine and books, and increasing the VAT rate for home-heating fuel.