Coalition tension over handling of exemptions

Tensions are growing between the Coalition partners over the handling of last week’s announcement of exemptions to the property tax, which one junior minister admitted was “a mess”.

Labour Party’s Sean Sherlock issued a thinly-veiled attack on Phil Hogan, the environment minister, who flew out to Brussels last week as his department revealed that a large number of ghost estates would have to pay the tax.

This left Labour ministers Jan O’Sullivan and Pat Rabbitte defending the announcement that just 421 out of the 1,770 unfinished housing estates will be exempt from the tax, which comes into effect in July.