MINISTERS HAVE defended the introduction of the €100 household charge and attacked left-wing TDs who have called for a boycott.
Minister for the Environment Phil Hogan said the charge, which will raise €160 million in 2012, will go towards funding local services such as fire services and street lighting.
Mr Hogan said the Government was obliged to bring in the charge otherwise the country would not get the necessary funding to run the State from our EU partners.
He dismissed calls by left-wing TDs for a national boycott of the charge. “If people like Joe Higgins want to grandstand in the Dáil about it, they can tell the people where they’re going to get the money otherwise,” he said.
The United Left Alliance has committed itself to organising a nationwide boycott of the tax, which is due to be levied on households from January.
Socialist Party TD Joe Higgins claimed the charge could rise to €500 in a short time while his ULA colleague, Richard Boyd Barrett, said it charged the richest people the same rate as the poorest.
However Minister for Justice Alan Shatter said he did not understand “all of the excitement” about the new household charge, which would be less than €2 a week.
“I don’t believe that the vast majority of people who have a great deal of common sense are going to get overexcited about what is a very small charge in circumstances in which this State and this Government is bound by the EU/IMF agreement to put in place some property tax provision.”
Minister for Communications Pat Rabbitte defended the charge saying it was an interim measure that would be replaced by a properly calibrated property tax.
Fianna Fáil environment spokesman Niall Collins criticised the charge as “indiscriminate flat-rate” tax following the Government’s success last week in reducing the payments on the bailout package by €1 billion.
Mr Collins said the Government had missed a real opportunity to ease the burden on Irish households struggling with bills. “There were significant savings for Ireland resulting from developments in the euro zone.
“They have refused to pass on any of these savings to cash-strapped households across the country,” he said.