Calleary questions Property Tax criteria for ghost estates

Minister must explain Property Tax criteria for ghost estates – Calleary


Áine Ryan
aineryan@mayonews.ie

MAYO TD Dara Calleary has called on the Minister for the Environment to explain the criteria he used to classify houses in ghost estates as eligible for the controversial Property Tax. He told The Mayo News yesterday that many of these residents – who were exempted from last year’s household charge – are living without street lighting or finished road surfaces.
The Ballina-based deputy now wants Minister Hogan to clarify what new criteria were used to classify an estate as finished and if the standards used are acceptable  to the local authority. He also wants the minister to explain how some houses in the same estate were eligible for exemption while others were not.   
“I have put down a question for the Minister as to how he reached the criteria for exempting some estates. At the moment there are 62 unfinished estates in County Mayo but only five of them are exempted from paying the Property Tax,” Deputy Calleary said.
He said he expected the question to be addressed in the DΡil next Thursday evening (March 28).
Deputy Calleary said  he agreed with Labour Party Minister for State, Sean Sherlock who told RTE at the weekend that the introduction of the new charge was both ‘badly handled and badly communicated’.
 Moreover, in an earlier statement Deputy Calleary said: “It was only right that all of these unfinished estates across County Mayo were exempt from the household charge last year. Many of the residents are young families who paid way over the odds for what is now a seriously devalued home. They are deep in negative equity, struggling to pay their mortgages and living in unfinished surroundings with no end in sight. And now Fine Gael plans to hit them with new taxes on their homes.”
He said this ‘deeply unfair’ plan was causing much distress and that affected residents had a right to ‘an explanation’.
“The Government has tried to justify this by claiming that many of these unfinished estates have miraculously been completed and fixed over the past year. This will come as a surprise to the people living in dozens of estates across Mayo that are still clearly unfinished.  These people are ordinary families who were abandoned by developers and are now stuck without the amenities and services they paid for,” Dara Calleary said.

GHOST ESTATES IN MAIN TOWNS
Ballina     9
Claremorris     7
Castlebar     5
Westport     3
Belmullet     1

EXEMPTED GHOST ESTATES
Barcoon, Bangor Erris
Church Manor, Ballina
Cornwater Place, Ballinrobe
Highfield Drive, Achill
Knock Road, Ballyhaunis

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