Siptu Conference ‘End hospitality sector Vat benefit’

Siptu has renewed its call that the Government scrap the preferential 9% Vat rate for hotels and restaurants unless they agree to go into talks with the union on setting minimum levels for pay and conditions in the hospitality sector.

Hotel worker and Siptu shop steward Tim Herlihy told the union’s biennial conference in Cork’s City Hall yesterday that the cut in the rate from 13.5% to 9% was costing the exchequer €350m per year and that the deficit was being covered by the levy on private pensions.

He said the employers benefiting from the reduced tax rate were the same employers who were refusing to engage in Joint Labour Committees (JLCs).