Lively debate amongst Kilkenny councillors over controversial tax
A call to scrap the Universal Social Charge was backed by a majority of Kilkenny councillors after being put to a vote...
The issue of the Universal Social Charge (USC) sparked a lively debate amongst elected members at the latest plenary meeting of Kilkenny County Council.
Cllr Eugene McGuinness tabled a motion during the meeting calling on the Minister for Finance, the Tánaiste, and the Taoiseach to abolish the USC.
The motion argued that the USC was introduced as a temporary emergency revenue-raising measure during the financial crisis and that, with the Government now considering that crisis to be over, it should honour its commitment to abolish the charge and "put the money back in the pockets of the hard-pressed taxpayers of this country."
The proposal was challenged by Cllr Seán Ó hArgáin, who argued that there is a ‘consistent mantra’ that Ireland is ‘a high-tax economy’ but that ‘the facts are different’.
“We are getting relatively low levels of services in this country because we have low levels of taxes,” he said, making a direct comparison between Ireland and Denmark” (which he had visited recently as part of an AILG delegation).
Cllr Ó hArgáin criticised what he called the "consistent chasing of an American low taxation model", warning that it "would be going down a very foolish way".
He did note Cllr McGuinness’ earlier point that Tánaiste Simon Harris had pledged to abolish the USC before the 2016 election, and stated that ‘political parties should be held to account’.
Cllr Ó hArgáin was backed by his party colleague, Cllr Tomás Breathnach, resulting in the motion being put to a vote. It was ultimately carried by a majority of councillors.
Amongst those who voted against the motion was Cllr Pat Fitzpatrick, despite having previously called for the abolition of the USC in 2023.