Topline appears in Customer Experience Top 100 Report 2017
October 4, 2017
Record keeping requirements for wholesalers and retailers of rodenticide products
October 17, 2017Minister for Finance & Public Expenditure, Pascal Donohoe announced his first Budget this afternoon. He noted that “Commencement notices for new housing are up 47%,” and commented that planning permissions were up 49% this year. Notable aspects from a Housing perspective include:
- Allocating €1.83bn for housing in 2018 – 3,800 new social homes will be built by local authorities.
- The Housing Assistance Payment scheme will be increased by €149 million.
- Extra €500 million for the direct building programme.
- Up to €750 million of the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund will be made available for commercial investment in housing finance. The funds are to be made available to a new vehicle to be known as Home Building Finance Ireland or HBFI.
- The level of stamp duty on commercial property transactions will increase from 2% to 6% from midnight tonight.
- He confirmed the State would launch a Brexit loan scheme for SMEs.
- Up to €300 million will be made available at a competitive rate.
Tax and USC:
- The 2.5% rate of USC will reduce to 2% and its ceiling will rise from €18,772 to €19,372.
- The next rate up reduces from 5% to 4.75%.
- Income tax bands – the first higher band is increasing from €33,800 to €34,550.
- The top rate of tax moves up to 48.75% on income up to €70,044.
Self-employed:
- He announced a ‘Keep Employee Engagement Programme (KEEP)’ which could assist in retaining staff with an advantageous tax treatment of share options.
Full details of Budget 2018 are available in the Budget Statement.
