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Clamour To Avoid Household Charge Begins In Offaly

Thursday, 19 January 2012

A CLAMOUR to avoid the new household charge is already beginning after Offaly County Council released a list of estates which will be exempt from the €100 tax.
Homeowners in a total of 26 'unfinished' estates in the county will not have to pay the charge but it emerged this week that many houses in them were never sold and are unoccupied.
It was also claimed this week that many other new estates should be exempt because of the sub-standard infrastructure.
Just one estate in Tullamore will be exempt, Church Hill on the Hophill Road, trumpeted at the peak of the property boom as the 'most exclusive address' in the county town.
Five estates in Edenderry are on the unfinished list, as are others in places as far apart as Moneygall in the south of Offaly to Cloghan in the west.
At a meeting of the County Council on Monday, where the local authority's head of finance Declan Conlon confirmed that cash payments for the charge will be accepted at council headquarters in Tullamore, councillors reacted angrily to the new regime.
Many queried the list of unfinished estates while others said they were opposed outright to the charge.
There were also concerns about the implications for the funding of the County Council itself, as income from the charge will go towards the Government's local government fund.
Mr Conlon revealed that 'a good lot of people' had already come into the council looking for the application forms which can be used to register for the charge.
Responding to a claim from Cllr Tommy McKeigue that cash payments were not being accepted, Mr Conlon said that for the household charge they were, but for the NPPR (non principal private residence, or 'second home') they were not.
'There was a bit of confusion in the first day or two,' said Mr Conlon.
He said an unfinished estate was defined as one where the construction of some houses had commenced but had not finished.
Cllr Noel Bourke said that Derrycoris Drive in Edenderry should have been included in the list of unfinished estates because there were 'manholes sticking up' and the public lighting was poor.
There were also problems with the drainage and sewerage, said the Edenderry councillor.
Cllr Eddie Fitzpatrick said two estates on the list, one in Geashill and one in Cloneygowan, were 'not relevant' because no-one every lived in them.
Cllr Fitzpatrick also said he knew of four estates in Portarlington which should be on the list and he hoped there could be an appeal system for residents.
At the same time, Cllr Fitzpatrick said he believed 'the majority' of households would pay the €100 charge.
Cllr John Leahy said the charge was a 'hard pill to swallow' and a more up to date list of unfinished estates was needed, including Coill Beg in Banagher where the sewage was inadequate.
Cllr Leahy said he knew the enforcement section of the council was working on the problem and he hoped there would be support from the Government for enforcement.
Cllr John Carroll was the first councillor to say he was totally opposed to the charge, labelling it as 'wrong' and merely another charge being levied on the people to 'pay off the bondholders and the bankers of Europe'.
Ireland was going pay a 'billion euro bill' for bondholders later this month, Cllr Carroll claimed, adding that the money was not for local government at all.
'It's a clear example again of the loss of sovereignty this country has suffered,' said the Independent councillor.
'It's not going to make our lives any easier or the lives of our local authorities any easier.'
Cllr Molly Buckley was told there would be no waiver for the disabled people and Cllr Ger Plunkett said he knew of estates in Walsh Island and Ballinagar which should have been in the exemption list.
He said people in estates without services would be up in arms and he queried what 'genius' had come up with such a 'ridiculous' list.
Like Cllr Carroll, Cllr Johnny Butterfield was against the concept of the charge and said we were only following 'dictats from Europe'.
'I don't think this is appropriate. I don't think it's fair,' said Cllr Butterfield.
Cllr Tony McLoughlin made the point that many people had already paid stamp duty and he said the bond should be retained from developers who left unfinished estates behind.
According to Cllr Sinead Dooley, the whole charge could be legally flawed because if a person did not register their property there was no evidence of them entering into a contract at all.
Cllr Dervill Dolan said he was opposed to the charge and stated that he was disappointed, but not surprised that Fianna Fail and Fine Gael were accepting that it was going to be introduced.
The Independent councillor said he would pay the charge, but only because it had been enacted by the Oireachtas.
But he added: 'This is an issue which goes to the very core of where we go as a country, where we are on the sovereignty of the country.'
Cllr Dolan warned that the charge would be a multiple of the €100 in the future and he accused the political parties of 'sitting dumb' while the speculators and investors, who brought the 'country to our knees' were being accommodated.
The councillor returned to what he saw as the real problem, the Croke Park agreement which protected the pay of people in the public sector, including council management, TDs, Senators and councillors.
Cllr Dolan said that Offaly had 48 council positions across the county and town councils. 'For a small county like Offaly that's not sustainable paying those people salaries and expenses,' he said.
Another Independent, Cllr John Foley, said the charge should be 'called off' and said that if it was the previous Government which had introduced it, there would be 'uproar' on Offaly County Council.
The meeting was also told that the list of unfinished estates was drawn up by the Department of the Environment and if it was changed, those who registered could get a refund.
The county manager, Pat Gallagher, warned that funding for the council could be hit if all householders don't pay the charge.
'There is a risk there that if the charge is not paid in full that our local government allocation will not be paid in full,' said Mr Gallagher.
Told that the Government was anticipating €160 million income from 1.6 million households in the country, Cllr Eamon Dooley said it would get 'an awful lot less' after all the exemptions and waivers were taken out.

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