THERE’S AN UNUSUAL entrant on the just-published list of tax defaulters released by the Revenue Commissioners.

The Houses of the Oireachtas Service has the dubious honour of making the list for under-declaring PAYE/PRSI to the tune of €333,412.

The entry for the Houses of the Oireachtas service says that there was a total of €227k in under-declared tax, €68k in penalties, and €37k in interest.

There is a note on the entry which states that it was a Revenue audit case.

The service is the administrative part of the Houses of the Oireachtas. There are roughly 378 full-time civil servants working in the service which looks after areas such as human resources, house services, library and research, and committees.

The Houses of the Oireachtas say that the disclosure was voluntary.

“On the 19th December 2012 the Houses of the Oireachtas Service made an unprompted voluntary disclosure to the Revenue Commissioners as set out under the Code of Practice for Revenue Auditors. This voluntary disclosure arose directly following our analysis of all taxis taken over the course of a three year period and the analysis was undertaken as part of our commitment to best corporate practice and governance and our ongoing oversight of expenditure.

The Houses of the Oireachtas Service has had an on-going practice to provide taxis to staff who stay late to perform official functions for the Houses of the Oireachtas. During analysis of all trips taken during the course of the last three years it was apparent that many taxis taken from work to home were taken outside of Revenue allowable taxi journeys.

Revenue published its quarterly list today showing people and businesses who have reached a settlement with Revenue in the first three months of this year.

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