This article is from page 16 of the 2010-01-05 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 16 JPG
HONEST Clare people are at the bottom of the tax-dodgers league, with just seven spongers per 10,000 of the population.
According to figures just published which outline the figures relating to tax defaulters over the last nine years, there were just 83 people in Clare’s 110,950 population – 7.48 per 10,000 head of population.
This puts Clare third from the bot-
tom of the league, bested only by Kildare, which had 7.30 defaulters per 10,000 head of population and Dublin, which had 6.48.
Of those who were named and shamed in the county, 15 were farm- ers, 18 were company directors, 15 were builders, seven were in the re- tail trade, two were publicans, four were employees, two worked in the restaurant or fast food trade, one in the motor trade, six in the hotel or guesthouse business and one was a
landlord.
There were no Clare towns named in the top 30 tax defaulter towns, and no Clare names appeared in the list of top ten overall tax defaulters or the top 20 Ansbacher case de- faulters.
Top of the league for being in trou- ble with the Revenue Commission- ers were Kerry people, who had 403 defaulters unmasked in the same period, 28.82 per 10,000 head of population.
Dublin had 769 declared defaulters but because of the massive popula- tion – 1,187,176 – remained at the bottom of the league of shame.
Limerick was also well down, eight from the bottom with 11.52 defaulters per 10,000 population and Tipperary was fourth from the top at 19.30 for the same number of people.
Over the last nine years, the Rev- enue Commissioners have published the names of 4,961 people who have
made settlements with them.
The names are published in the Iris Oifigidil, the Irish State Gazette, by the Revenue Commissioners each quarter. The names of tax default- ers are published where the settle- ment was in excess of €30,000, or €12,700 if pre 2005, and if the amount of fine or penalty included in the setthement exceeded 15 per cent of the tax and where the taxpay- er did not avail of the opportunity to make a voluntary disclosure.