House tax handling was far from ideal, says Shortall

Mistakes were made in the rollout of the household tax, ministers admitted as the scale of the mass boycott continued to embarrass the Government.

Róisín Shortall, minister of state at the Department of Health, denied the charge had been a disaster but conceded it was “far from ideal as a system and far from ideal how it was handled”.

With the Government unable to say with for certain how many homes were eligible for the levy, political debate continued to rage over whether even half of those due to pay the charge had registered.

Just over 829,000 households had complied with the law and registered for the €100 tax by yesterday — which meant that at least a roughly similar number had boycotted the money-raising initiative.

Ms Shortall said lessons needed to be learned from the boycott.

“There is a need now to take stock, to see where people haven’t been making the payment and why they haven’t been making the payment. I think we need to see where mistakes were made and how we can improve compliance with this charge,” she told RTÉ.

Government threats to cut funds to councils where registration had proved low provoked anger from anti-tax campaigners.

Ruth Coppinger of the Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes said such a move would see well-off areas rewarded while councillors with poorer families would be penalised.

“Those boroughs with a higher number of wealthier residents who can afford to pay the tax would be given even more government funding, while less well-off districts would be penalised,” she said.

Socialist TD Joe Higgins branded the threat an “outrage”. “If they go along these lines they will be encouraging massive social dislocation and further social inequality. It will simply not be permissible. There will be an outcry, an upheaval against that. It will be outrageous,” he said.

Environment Minister Phil Hogan, who has been criticised for the way the tax has been implemented, stressed that the measure was part of the emergency bailout deal with the troika and the Government had no choice in its introduction.