Unions To Urge Taoiseach To Scrap Tax Levy

Union leaders are to meet the Taoiseach in a bid to have the 1% tax levy scraped for all workers.

The levy will see tens of thousands of people pay tax for the first time. Unions say this will impact badly on low paid workers who will see a drastic decrease in their income.

On Thursday, SIPTU General Secretary Joe O'Flynn told the Union's Dublin Regional Conference the employment levy in the Budget would seriously undermine the new national agreement and the prospects of workers voting for it.

The Union has already postponed a decision on whether to recommend the proposed pay deal until a meeting on the new income levy has been held.

Mr Flynn said: "This flies in the face of all our efforts over successive agreements to protect the lower paid and, even at this late stage, should be reversed so that all earnings up to the average industrial wage are removed from the levy."

The SIPTU chief added: "There are other more effective means of meeting Exchequer requirements without hurting the less well off and the working poor. The imposition of the levy is regressive and a crude imposition on the very workers who contributed to creating the most productive elements of the Celtic Tiger economy."

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions joined the dissent describing the levy as an "indiscriminate attack on the lower paid."

Congress General Sectetary David Begg said "This levy is wrong, it makes no sense and is a real political mistake on the part of government."

The congress is proposing people earning less than €23,000 should be exempt from the levy.

(DW)