SF councillor seeks rationale behind non-payment of Government charges

Seamus Enright The leader of Sinn Fein within Cavan County Council has called for a survey to be carried out to discover the rationale among the public behind the non-payment of the Household Charge, and the growing rumblings towards the proposed new Property Tax. Cllr Charlie Boylan asked the Council if it would be possible to carry out a survey asking people why they did not want to pay the Government charges, when he said, "the money goes to providing the local services" for them. He asked if greater "clarity" was needed to show exactly where the money they paid was going to, and "That it isn't just going to bail out the bankers". Speaking to The Anglo-Celt, Cllr Boylan denied that in questioning why people weren't paying, he was going against the party's stance on the matter. He said that he remained of the opinion that "those who can afford it should pay it." At the October monthly meeting held last week, Cllr Boylan put forward a number of proposals which he said, if investigated, could potentially free up much needed funding for local authorities across the country. He asked that, in the case of the proposed changes to Motor Tax, that any increase in revenue should be fully allocated back to local authorities to use at their own discretion, on road repair and maintenance works, to alleviate flooding on roadways and other local improvement schemes. He said this could be introduced on a trial basis at first, between two to five years to see how such a system would work. Cllr Boylan also proposed that an amount of not less than 3.5% of all VAT collected at the higher rate of 23% in a local authority area should be returned on a bi-monthly basis to improve the cash flow to local authorities. It was agreed that both proposals should be forwarded to the Minister for Finance, Michael Noonan prior to the Budget being drawn up next month. The proposals were also widely supported across the various parties.