Tax Code
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-24
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Albert Dolan (FF), Galway East

I really appreciate the sentiment the Minister of State has delivered before this House. There is an opportunity here for the Government to send a clear signal that for people who are working and contributing to our society and who want to accumulate a security buffer or a cushion, we will support them to do so, not just for their pension but for when other things arise in life as well. I believe that the deemed disposal must go because I fundamentally believe it is unfair to tax somebody on an unrealised gain. I also agree that it is vital that whatever we put in place has to benefit people and work properly. In the UK they have the ISA-style saving account. In the US they have a Roth IRA account. These are unique and novel ideas where you can give tax efficiency on smaller investment amounts or you can decide not to tax the capital gain or you can decide to allow people to accumulate more.
We have to acknowledge in this House that we do not have the same stock exchange here in Ireland that we once had. Our stock exchange is weak and companies are choosing to list on markets where they can access greater capital. We have to look at that. Perhaps it would make sense to incentivise people to invest in Irish companies. I believe the employment investment incentive scheme, EIIS, works really well but it is a very concentrated risk. You invest in a company with EIIS and it ultimately is a start-up with a higher probability of failing than a diversified fund. If you invest in a fund, you have an opportunity to spread your risk across multiple companies. I really do believe that if we encourage people to invest in the Irish stock exchange tax efficiently, we would see more Irish companies investing here in Ireland and raising capital in Ireland. We would also see Irish people being very proud to have a share and ownership in Irish companies.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-24/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:40+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-24