TAXES SHOULD be imposed on house sales, property tax reliefs should be suspended, while gambling and inheritance taxes should be sharply increased, a leading trade union has urged.
The proposals were submitted to this week’s collapsed social partnership talks by the Association of Higher Civil and Public Servants, which represents more than 3,000 senior civil servants and managers in the commercial and non-commercial State sector.
In a detailed paper, it said the “equity accumulated in private houses escapes taxation”, while “attempts at imposing a property tax in the past have been very hard to administer”.
Under the proposal, house-sellers would enjoy a tax exemption up to the average family home value, but would pay Capital Gains Tax on the rest, minus the original price of the property.
This not "only raises revenue but applies a property tax when funds are available to pay it rather than looking for annual amounts out of current income", according to the union's document seen by The Irish Times.
Calling for higher inheritance taxes, it said that capital acquisitions tax does not apply to transfers worth less than €542,544 from a parent to a child. The threshold exemption applies to each child. The union suggested that a minimum rate should be imposed at a 22 per cent rate on one-tenth of the value of the estate.
The union also cited the fact that bookmakers will be entitled from May to offset a 2 per cent betting duty against their income tax bills. Last year, €3.6 billion was laid in bets.
