Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams is examining whether any tax is due on an American businessman’s payment of medical expenses for him in the US.
Bill Flynn, former chief of life insurance giant Mutual of America, is estimated to have paid €30,000 late last year for Mr Adams’s prostate procedure.
The Sinn Féin leader, who is TD for Louth, is tax-resident in the State, according to a party spokesman.
The Irish Times asked yesterday whether Mr Adams planned to seek an exemption from gift tax on grounds that Mr Flynn’s payment was to defray medical expenses.
“Mr Adams is consulting with his tax advisers as to whether any taxation arises from this medical procedure, and if there is an issue he will ensure that he is fully tax-compliant,” the Sinn Féin spokesman replied.
In general, gift tax applies where the person making the gift or the recipient is resident or ordinarily resident in the State at the date of the gift.
However, gifts received exclusively for the purpose of discharging the qualifying expenses of a person permanently incapacitated due to physical infirmity can be exempted.
The gift recipient must apply to Revenue to avail of this exemption, said a Revenue spokeswoman, who stressed she was speaking generally and not referring to any individual case.
Mr Adams told RTÉ interviewer Marian Finucane last weekend that the procedure in the US was to deal with a “long-standing and very painful complaint”.
