Monaghan's Cathy Bennett has laid out the Sinn Féin stall regarding residential zoned land and the tax farmers were expected to pay. The Cathaiorleach of Monaghan County Council said Sinn Féin "are all about housing" and said her party are bringing out a new policy document on the issue next month.
At the start of this week, the government announced it was to defer the residential zoned land tax for a year. The RZLT is a tax farmers were expected to pay if they did not release land from their farms which was zoned residential, to developers. Farmers' organisations had argued that landowners who were actively farming their land should not be forced to sell it to property developers or be penalised for holding on to it.
Sinn Féin and the Green Party were both very critical of the government's u-turn in the middle of a housing crisis. Sinn Féin Monaghan County Councillor Cathy Bennett clarified her party's position: "Sinn Féin have a new policy document coming out in September and we're all about housing," she told the Joe Finnegan Show, "So, if a farmer's sitting on land he has to make the decision: you're either going to pay the taxes on it or you're going to change the zoning on it so that it will be available. We have to make it available to build on so, I suppose that's our priorities and it will be our priorities if we're in government."
