Property tax has not come up with the goods, Charlie

While the Revenue Commissioners took a bit of a hammering over their diffident attitude to the banks on the payment of DIRT tax, they certainly have a long memory when it comes to the once-dreaded Residential Property Tax. Though the mainly Dublin tax was abolished in 1997, the Revenue has this week reminded those selling houses for over £342,000 that they will still need a clearance certificate to show that RPT was paid in the years it was in operation.

The renewed vigilance by Dublin Castle yielded the princely sum of £2.3 million last year (from 2,443 households) and £1.5 million in 1999 from 4,765 house sellers who had either not paid the RPT or who had undervalued their homes.

Surely the Revenue has bigger fish to fry at this stage. With so much tax evasion in other quarters, Charlie McCreevy should now do the decent thing - close down the RPT division once and for all and divert these resources to more lucrative targets than a few retired couples trying to cash in their chips while there is still a property market. Get a life, Charlie.