POLITICAL REACTION:THE LATEST report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) showed there was "still a culture of non-compliance and non-payment of tax in Ireland", Labour's deputy leader and finance spokeswoman Joan Burton said last night.
The report showed that the Revenue Commissioners only carried out 14,000 targeted audits and about 400 random audits, which yielded a total of €687.6 million. "It begs the question of why Revenue do not significantly increase the audit programme," Ms Burton said.
The CAG also reported that €2.4 billion had been paid to date as a consequence of the special investigations arising from Ansbacher, Dirt, off-shore assets, life assurance products and other investigations. Ms Burton commented: "Former finance minister Charlie McCreevy famously said that there were no 'pots of gold' of unpaid taxes. €2.4 billion is quite a pot of gold."
She said the Revenue Commissioners were to be congratulated for finally agreeing to do more specific checks in certain sectors such as security and construction. "The report shows that carrying out such checks has resulted in significant recovery of unpaid taxes.
"During 2007, while 12 people were imprisoned as a result of welfare fraud, none of the nine people convicted for serious tax evasion during 2007 are likely to spend any time behind bars."
Noting that An Post was paid some €14.7 million for sending out almost 26 million pieces of general election and Seanad election literature to electors, she added: "it would be much less wasteful if literature was sent out to each household rather than each individual".
Fine Gael spokesman on enterprise, trade and employment, Leo Varadkar said in a statement: "Many of the items reported by the CAG relate to wasted expenditure by various State bodies, agencies and quangos. Fine Gael has already highlighted the problems associated with the explosion of quangos and the apparent lack of strict financial oversight associated with them.
"The CAG needs to continue to examine these bodies to ensure that any wasteful practices cease and to make sure that the public's money is spent in the most effective and efficient manner."
Labour's environment spokeswoman Joanna Tuffy called for "an immediate explanation" of the CAG's finding that "over €9 million of the €13 million allocated by the Office of Public Works to local authorities under the Flood Relief scheme will go unspent this year".
"What it means to people living in flood-prone areas is that action, which should and could be taken to reduce the risk to their property and their livelihoods, has never been carried out, despite the fact that the required money is available."
