A Fine Gael senator has contravened political standards regulations by failing to provide evidence of tax compliance to the Standards in Public Office Commission.
The Commission has today issued details of its investigation into Senator Pat O’Neill. He was obliged by law to supply the Commission with evidence of tax compliance within nine months of his election, by January 26th.
Mr O’Neill was elected to the agricultural panel of the Seanad for Fine Gael in April 2011.
To date he has not given either a tax clearance certificate or an application statement (showing he has requested a tax clearance certificate from Revenue) to the Commission, it said The Commission had notified Mr O’Neill in April that they would be investigating him.
It told him that it would “consider an explanation he may wish to provide in relation to the contravention”. The Commission had received no reply from the senator, it said. The Commission has phoned his office on four occasions and has written three letters since the January deadline passe.
In February Mr O’Neill gave the Commission a statutory declaration (a self-declaration of tax compliance). However politicians also need to provide either a tax clearance certificate or an application statement.
Mr O’Neill told The Irish Times that he had paid Revenue in full last week and had applied for a tax clearance certificate.
Mr O’Neill said he would be writing to the Commission on Monday. He had been paying off capital gains tax over the past few months, he said. It had not been cleared because something held it up, he said . However the balance was paid to Revenue last week, he said.
The Commission has sent its report to the Seanad’s committee on member’s interests.
The actions the Seanad committee can propose include; noting the contents of the report or censuring Mr O’Neill, suspending him for up to 30 days which can include withholding of salary. Fine Gael said it was a matter that the party would “ investigate fully and deal with expeditiously” and that it was treating with “the utmost seriousness.”
The Commission said that 17 senators had broken the Standards in Public Office Act by failing to file the documents in time. However relevant documents had been since received by all senators aside from Pat O’Neill.
