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Jack O'Connor Laura Hutton/Photocall Ireland

SIPTU president urges Taoiseach to introduce pensions tax sooner

In a letter to Taoiseach Enda Kenny, Jack O’Connor says that introducing the 41 per cent rate on pensions over €60,000 sooner would obviate the need for certain cuts.

SIPTU GENERAL PRESIDENT Jack O’Connor has written to Taoiseach Enda Kenny urging him to bring forward plans to limit the tax relief on pensioners earning over €60,000 annually.

In a letter (published in full below) O’Connor says that implementing the measure next year rather than the year after, as the government has said, would generate an extra €125 million for the Exchequer.

The government plans to claim 41 per cent of the value of pension payments in excess of €60,000 per year but the measure will not come into effect until 2014 due to legal issues.

O’Connor has asked Kenny to intervene in the matter personally and says that all of the arrangements could be put in place for the measure to be implemented by the 1 July next year, negating the need for some cuts to services.

He said that it “would also serve to go some way towards contributing to social cohesion at this crucial moment in our history”.

Read the letter in full:

Read: SIPTU condemns ‘fascist behaviour’ at  austerity protest

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34 Comments
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    Mute Joan Featherstone
    Favourite Joan Featherstone
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    Jun 17th 2014, 1:37 PM

    Congrats, well done! A subject near to my heart.

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    Mute James Mcguinness
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    Jun 17th 2014, 12:21 PM

    Make sure you tell him no testing on children now!

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    Mute Rupert McPupkin
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    Jun 17th 2014, 1:56 PM

    James, I think your comment went over the heads of most people – I know where you’re coming from though.

    Wellcome or Wellcome Trust, now merged into GlaxoSmithKline, is the pharmaceutical company that mistakenly administered CATTLE vaccines to 80 babies and children in “mother and baby” homes in Ireland.

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    Mute denis shields
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    Jun 17th 2014, 2:21 PM

    Wellcome Trust is not the Wellcome Foundation. Sir Henry Wellcome used a whole lot of money he got from the Wellcome Foundation (which was the pharmaceutical company now merged with GSK) to set up an independent medical charity called the Wellcome Trust which is not controlled by pharmaceutical companies. They fund various kinds of medical research. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wellcome_Trust
    for more details.

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    Mute Rupert McPupkin
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    Jun 17th 2014, 2:42 PM

    Denis,

    The Trust only “divested itself of any interest in pharmaceuticals” in 1995 so, as far as I’m concerned, Wellcome Trust was indeed linked to Wellcome Foundation during the cattle vaccine “studies” in “mother and baby” homes, all of which were carried out prior to 1995.

    So, I’m sorry – I’m not convinced by your explanation.
    .

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