Mr Dermot Quigley, who was responsible for drafting the legislation setting up the Criminal Assets Bureau, is to be the new chairman of the Revenue Commissioners.
Mr Quigley will take up the post from July 3rd when the present chairman, Mr Cathal MacDomhnaill, reaches normal retirement age. His appointment was announced by the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, yesterday.
The Minister congratulated Mr MacDomhnaill on his service to the State and on the success of his period of office as chairman.
Mr Quigley is already responsible for many of the key areas of the Revenue's operations - from tax collection to the budget and EU affairs - and has been credited with key moves to modernise the organisation over the past few years.
He first made his name at the Department of Finance as a member of the decimalisation and currency board in 1971 before moving on to be a key decision maker on the move into the European Monetary System in 1979.
He was assistant secretary on the Budget side at the Department of Finance when he transferred to the Revenue in 1990. After the move, he continued to work on the single market. He is still involved with all tax-related business with Brussels and has been part of the team defending Ireland's corporation tax regime in negotiations with the EU.
He is also a vice-chairman of the World Customs Organisation and is the regional representative for Europe, co-ordinating the input of 45 European and former Soviet bloc countries.
While he has been involved with much of the Revenue's work over the past eight years, his priorities are seen to have been achieving clarity in tax legislation, working on anti-drug measures such as the Criminal Assets Bureau and the move to voluntary compliance as well as decentralisation.
He is seen as having sympathy will small business and has spoken at the annual conferences of both the Irish Small and Medium Enterprise's Association and the Small Firms' Association. Two years ago' ISME gave him the public sector award for most improved performance from a Government department.
The new chairman was also involved in the preparation of the Taxes Consolidation Act, which halved the total amount of tax legislation. As one of the three members of the Revenue's board, Mr Quigley is responsible for all the tax policy areas from direct taxes, income and corporation tax to indirect and capital taxes. He also has a policy advisory role on taxes with the Department of Finance.
The decentralisation of the Collector General's Office and its move with 500 staff to Limerick is also credited to him. And he was involved in streamlining collection services and the new working approach which ensures arrears are more regularly followed up as well as the introduction of new technology to the system.
In the Department of Finance, he worked on borrowing and debt management in the late 1980s.
Married to Dolores, he has six children and was born and brought up in Bray, Co Wicklow but attended CBS in Westland Row in Dublin and UCD. He also has a diploma from the International Monetary Fund in Washington DC.
