Revenue will target tax cheats' advisers

The Revenue Commissioners will consider asking for a change in the law to make it easier to pursue banks and financial advisers for aiding and abetting tax evaders.

Revenue chairman Mr Frank Daly told the Dáil Committee of Public Accounts (PAC) yesterday that the Commissioners "would love" to be able to take an aiding and abetting charge in relation to tax evasion.

"It would be very good for Revenue and for the country if we could see some aiding and abetting convictions," he said.

Mr Daly was responding to questions from Fine Gael TD Mr Michael Noonan, who suggested that those who had advised tax evaders to hide their money from the Revenue were getting away "scot free".

Mr Daly said he would not disagree that some advice had been given by a third party in many cases of tax evasion.

He pointed out, however, that current rules require an "onerous" level of proof before an aiding and abetting conviction could be secured.

"We will probably be making a proposal to have that changed," he said, indicating that the Commissioners would look for new rules to be included in next year's Finance Act.

He acknowledged, however, that such a measure would probably not apply retrospectively.

The situation was further complicated, he said, by the need for the tax evader's co-operation in pursuing a particular conviction. "They tend to not want to have anything to do with us again," Mr Daly acknowledged.

Presenting an update on Revenue's offshore investigations to the committee, Mr Daly also revealed that Anglo Irish Bank had this week made a settlement of €3.16 million in connection with the bank's DIRT liability.

The settlement relates to a "re-audit" of Anglo Irish under Revenue's investigations into bogus non-resident accounts. Anglo Irish had originally been cleared by the Revenue's look-back audits, which occurred after the PAC's DIRT inquiry.

It emerged last October, however, that some customers at the bank did have bogus non-resident accounts that could carry a DIRT liability.

Anglo Irish chief executive Mr Seán FitzPatrick said at the time that the bank would still not have to pay DIRT the way other banks had because it had supporting documentation indicating that its non-resident accounts were genuine.

A new audit was commissioned, however, and this week's settlement is the result.

The bulk of the settlement covers interest and penalties, with just €1.07 million relating to actual DIRT. This brings the total DIRT paid by financial institutions under the investigation to €225 million.

Anglo Irish chief financial officer Mr Matt Moran said yesterday that the settlement had brought "closure" to the matter. "From that perspective, it's satisfactory," he added.

The Anglo Irish settlement lifts the total collected to date by the Revenue under its offshore account and trust investigations to €1.556 billion.

This includes €677 million paid by 14,000 individuals under the Revenue's most recent campaign to encourage offshore account holders to pay voluntarily any taxes they may owe.

Some €27 million of this has been received by Revenue over the past four weeks.

Outside Dublin, the largest number of voluntary disclosures came from Donegal, followed by Monaghan, Cork and Louth.

The high incidence of undeclared accounts in the Border counties reflects their proximity to the North, where 60 per cent of the accounts already disclosed were held.

Mr Daly said the Revenue had begun "preparatory work" to secure the High Court orders it needs to identify the holders of offshore accounts who did not disclose a tax liability under the voluntary phase.

People who are found to have a tax liability at this point will face extra penalties and the publication of their names in Iris Oifigiúil.

"Nobody should be in any doubt about our intention to follow through on this investigation," said Mr Daly.