A tax amnesty in disguise

It doesn't really matter what you call it, the Revenue Commissioners' offer to errant non-resident account-holders is an amnesty. The better question is whether an amnesty is a good idea in the circumstances.Revenue chairman Dermot Quigley and his team are prepared to give those people who have been salting away money in bogus non-resident accounts - money on which they should have paid income or other taxes - six months to get their act together. Furthermore, the Revenue will cap the level at which it will impose interest and penalties so tax evaders will not pay more than twice the tax due in total. That is a deal, an amnesty. It is not on offer to others evading the same taxes through avenues other than non-resident accounts.

However, in the light of the number of accounts in question - the best guess is of anything up to 50,000 - pragmatism was bound to prevail. As Mr Quigley said, if the Revenue were to go after everyone in the normal fashion, it would not have the staff resources to police tax evasion elsewhere.

It may not be fair to those taxpayers who assiduously followed the rules down the years but at least the evaders in this instance will pay something - which is more than would have happened before the DIRT inquiry.