Tax liabilities for bogus non-resident account holders may be "far more significant in amount" than any unpaid DIRT, the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, has warned.
He told the Dail debate on the DIRT inquiry report that the source of the money on deposit in many of the bogus accounts might well have been undeclared business income, and the unpaid taxes could be much larger than DIRT.
The Minister said the Revenue Commissioners would consider this when they finish the DIRT audit of the financial institutions, which is expected to be complete by mid-year. He said it "is for the Revenue Commissioners to decide how they will go about this".
When the audit of the financial institutions was finished Revenue would present the results to managements and seek to reach agreement on the amount of underpaid DIRT along with interest and penalties. If agreement was reached, the case could be settled. Otherwise, an assessment would be made by Revenue which could be appealed to the Appeal Commissioners and the courts.
Mr Conor Lenihan (FF, Dublin South West) said that he was shocked and appalled by the reaction to the remarks of the Taxing Master, Mr James Flynn, last week. "There was a great deal of sense in what he said regarding the tribunals and perhaps it offended certain members that he threw down the gauntlet to the Houses of the Oireachtas."
Mr Pat Rabbitte, (Labour, Dublin South West), a member of the Public Accounts Committee, criticised the media coverage of the proceedings of the Dail.
On any given day, "it has diminished to a quarter of a page in the paper of record and frequently one cannot find it in the other newspapers. I am talking about coverage of the House as distinct from political stories, some of which are trivial. Only those stories which are controversial or negative are reported."
