A damning statistic.
A recent survey has found that 89% of people in Ireland do not believe the Government’s handling of the housing crisis is adequate.
This is according to the 1,000 Irish taxpayers who responded to the latest Taxpayer Sentiment Survey conducted by Taxback.com.
40% of those surveyed said the current housing budget should be put to better use and that there is no need to redistribute funds from other areas of public expenditure.
85% would support for incentives for the owners of derelict properties to encourage them to convert their premises into liveable rental accommodation, while 64% say that owners with derelict property should be levied with the additional tax.
82% of respondents think the Government should offer tax breaks to business owners to convert disused premises into housing, while two thirds of those surveyed believe that businesses that have sizeable unused property space should have to pay higher taxes.
Commenting on the findings Eileen Devereux, Commercial Director at Taxback.com said:
“We asked people if they believe the Government are taking the right approach to housing crisis and 89% said they did not. Notwithstanding the complexities of Ireland’s housing crisis, it seems that people are overwhelmingly dissatisfied with the Government’s handling of the issue to date.
“This is perhaps not wholly unexpected given the myriad of news stories each day highlighting the difficulties faced by thousands of families across the country. As taxpayers who contribute to the welfare of the country, we thought it would be interesting to see if people think their tax money should be spent differently.
“People are hungry for change, particularly it seems, in the ways in which the Government spends its budget and allocates its tax pot.”
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