Labour Party Conference Protest Planned

The Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes (CAHWT) are continuing their protests against the introduction of the new taxes. The next protest will take place at the Labour Party Conference in Galway.

The protest will begin at 1pm on the 14th of April in Galway City. CAHWT are hoping to send the same strong message sent to Fine Gael at their Ard Fheis in March.

On Thursday Mary Mitchell O'Connor urged payment of the Household tax by saying "I fear that resentment may occur between residents in a local area if some have paid their charge and others decide not to. We cannot expect our neighbours and friends to pick up the tab for the roads, playgrounds and other public facilities which we all use. In the interest of fairness, we all need to contribute." She also expressed happiness that her own constituency of Dun Laoghaire had the highest payment rate of the new tax, which may indicated that the local authority may receive the best funding with the Ministers new action plan for local authorities who collect the most.

The Government have outline two new aspects to the terms and conditions of payment of the Household charge, since they failed to receive in what many consider to be a high compliance rate for the tax. Firstly Minister Hogan has stated that local authority that have the best compliance rate among its citizens will be rewarded and secondly a new system of late payment fees, which have been attached to the original fee.