Farmers, self employed avoiding tax

OVER 1,000 farmers audited by the Revenue Commissioners in the last two years were found to be underpaying tax by an average of over £6,500 each.

And 10,000 self employed taxpayers audited over the same period owed between £8,300 and £9,900 on average, according to figures published yesterday by the Minister for Finance, Mr Quinn. The total amount raised from the audits was £46 million.

The minister said that as a result of these findings he has told the Revenue Commissioners to intensify their efforts to ensure that everyone pays the taxes they owe.

The minister outlined new details of Revenue audits of both the farming sector and the self employed in 1995 and 1996.

In 1995 the Revenue audited 613 farmers, yielding an extra £5 million to the Exchequer in unpaid taxes. This figures includes a single case involving a settlement of £1 million. When this is excluded, the average underpayment in that year was £6,500. Last year, a further 431 farmers were assessed yielding £3 million in additional tax. This works out at £6,700 per farmer on average.

The figures show that underpayments by the self employed were even higher. In 1995, 2,141 self employed taxpayers were audited, yielding an extra £17.7 million, an average of £8.300 each. This was followed by a further 2,044 audits last year, yielding £20.3 million, or £9,900 on average.

The minister's statement appears designed to try to demonstrate to PAYE taxpayers ahead of the election that efforts are being made to ensure that the self employed and farmers pay the tax they owe.

According to Mr Quinn, "It must not be left to the PAYE sector alone to continue to bear the bulk of the cost of funding the vast improvement in services to the public that we have witnessed over the past three years.

He said that as a result he has "asked the Revenue to intensify their efforts to ensure, to the greatest extent possible, that all those in society whose earnings are liable to tax should bear their fair share of the tax burden."

Fianna Fail has already targeted the Coalition about its attitude to the farming community, particularly claiming that Democratic Left has an anti farmer attitude.

But most of the parties have promised in their manifestos to continue to tighten up on lax collection to ensure that all due lax is paid.

Meanwhile, in a statement yesterday the Fianna Fail finance spokesman. Mr Charlie McCreevy, pointed to the Central Bank annual report, which said that this year's Budget was expansionary and would add to inflationary pressures as the year progresses.

"Our view is that proper tax relief should have been spread over three Budgets, instead of concentrating on one preeleetion Budget," he said. "That would be the course we will follow in government."