Will the Minister explain why in regard to a major piece of tax legislation it is being taken by the Minister for the Environment? Will the Minister agree that one would have assumed that this legislation in the normal way would have been prepared by the Minister for Finance? Is the legislation being taken by the Minister for the Environment because it will be a substitute for local rates which have been abolished? Will the Minister give me some information on the matter of adjusted acres? Will the Minister agree that the key to this tax proposal is the basis on which the adjusted acres are determined? Are we to take it that the system of measuring adjusted acres will be decided by the Department of the Environment in regard to this legislation?

The reason this legislation is being taken by the Department of the Environment is that it will be up to the local authorities to collect. That would be the normal position in regard to legislation dealing with local authorities. The tax is based on adjusted acreage and land will be classified according to its potential productivity. That is how the adjusted acreage will come about.

The Minister has not answered my question. Are we to take it now that this new tax will in fact be a form of local rates? Second, the question I asked him was: will the adjusted acres, or rather the format for deciding adjusted acres be a matter for the Minister for the Environment in the context of this legislation? There have been suggestions by the Minister that this work would be done by the staff of the Land Commission or perhaps by the Agricultural Institute. Are we now to take it that this key and very complex issue of deciding on adjusted acres will be done by the Minister for the Environment and his Department?

It will be done under the aegis of the Minister for the Environment, under the aegis of that Department. Its format, how it will be devised and who should do it are matters that will be teased out when the legislation has been passed.