Finance Act, 1967

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Relief for health expenses.

12.—(1) In this section—

“dependant” means, in relation to an individual,—

(a) where the individual is a married man who for the year of assessment is allowed the higher deduction under section 138 (1) of the Income Tax Act, 1967 , the wife of the individual, and

(b) any person in respect of whom the individual is allowed for the year of assessment a deduction under section 139, 140, 141 or 142 of that Act;

“health care” means prevention, diagnosis, alleviation or treatment of an ailment, injury, infirmity, defect or disability, and includes care which is received by a woman in respect of a pregnancy other than routine maternity care, but does not include routine ophthalmic treatment or routine dental treatment;

“health expenses” means expenses in respect of the provision of health care, being expenses representing the cost of—

(a) the services of a practitioner,

(b) diagnostic procedures carried out on the advice of a practitioner,

(c) maintenance or treatment in a hospital,

(d) drugs or medicines supplied on the prescription of a practitioner,

(e) the supply, maintenance or repair of any medical, surgical, dental or nursing appliance used on the advice of a practitioner,

(f) physiotherapy or similar treatment prescribed by a practitioner,

(g) orthoptic or similar treatment prescribed by a practitioner, or

(h) transport by ambulance;

“hospital” means—

(a) any health institution within the meaning of the Health Act, 1947 ,

(b) any institution in relation to which an arrangement made or deemed to have been made under section 10 of the Health Act, 1953 , applies,

(c) any hospital, nursing home or maternity home approved of by the Minister for Health for the purposes of section 25 of the Health Act, 1953 ,

(d) any other hospital, nursing home or maternity home approved of for the purposes of this section by the Minister for Finance after consultation with the Minister for Health;

“practitioner” means any person who is registered in the register established under section 21 of the Medical Practitioners Act, 1927 , or who is temporarily registered under section 3 of the Medical Practitioners Act, 1955 , or who is registered in the register established under section 23 of the Dentists Act, 1928 , or, in relation to health care provided outside the State, any person who is entitled under the laws of the country in which the care is provided to practise medicine or dentistry there;

“qualified person” means, in relation to an individual, the individual himself or any dependant of his;

“routine dental treatment” means the extraction, scaling and filling of teeth and the provision and repairing of artificial teeth or dentures;

“routine maternity care” means care—

(a) which is received by a woman in respect of a pregnancy otherwise than as a patient maintained in a hospital, or

(b) which is received by a woman in respect of a pregnancy as a patient maintained in hospital where the total length of the period or periods during which she is so maintained is not more than fourteen days or during the first fourteen days of such maintenance where the total length of such period or periods is more than fourteen days;

“routine ophthalmic treatment” means sight testing and advice as to the use of spectacles or contact lenses and the provision and repairing of spectacles or contact lenses.

(2) (a) Subject to the provisions of this section, where an individual, having made a claim in that behalf and having made a return in the prescribed form of his total income, proves that in the year of assessment he defrayed health expenses which were incurred for the provision of health care for any one qualified person and which amount in the aggregate to more than £50, he shall be entitled, for the purpose of ascertaining the amount of the income on which he is to be charged to income tax, to have a deduction of the appropriate amount made from his assessable income.

(b) In the foregoing paragraph “the appropriate amount” means—

(i) in case the aggregate of the health expenses is less than £300—the excess of that aggregate over £50, and

(ii) in case that aggregate is or exceeds £300—£250.

(3) For the purposes of this section—

(a) any expenses defrayed by a married woman in a year of assessment shall be deemed to have been defrayed by her husband if, for the year of assessment, she falls to be treated, under the Income Tax Acts, as living with her husband,

(b) any expenses defrayed out of the estate of a deceased person by his executor or administrator shall be deemed to have been defrayed by the deceased person immediately before his death,

(c) expenses shall be regarded as not having been defrayed in so far as any sum in respect of, or by reference to, the health care to which they relate has been, or is to be, received, directly or indirectly, by the individual or the individual's estate, or by any dependant of the individual or such dependant's estate, from any public or local authority or under any contract of insurance or by way of compensation or otherwise.

(4) In making a claim for a deduction under this section, an individual who, after the end of the year of assessment for which the claim is made, has defrayed, or is deemed to have defrayed, any expenses relating to health care provided in that year may elect that all deductions to be allowed to him under this section for that year and for subsequent years of assessment shall be determined as if those expenses had been defrayed at the time when the health care to which they relate was provided.

(5) (a) Any claim for a deduction under this section—

(i) shall be made in such form as the Revenue Commissioners may from time to time prescribe, and

(ii) shall be accompanied by such statements in writing as regards any class of expenses by reference to which the deduction is claimed, including statements by persons to whom payments were made, as may be indicated by the prescribed form as being required as regards expenses of that class.

(b) Relief from tax consequent on the allowance of a deduction under this section shall, in all cases, be given by way of repayment.

(c) Subject to the foregoing paragraphs of this subsection, all such provisions of the Income Tax Acts as apply in relation to every deduction specified in sections 138 to 143 of the Income Tax Act, 1967 , shall apply in relation to deductions under this section.

(6) Section 153 (1) (d) of the Income Tax Act, 1967 , is hereby amended by the insertion after “sections 138 to 143” of “and section 12 of the Finance Act, 1967”.

(7) Section 193 of the Income Tax Act, 1967 , is hereby amended—

(a) by the insertion in subsection (2) after paragraph (a) of the following paragraph:

“(aa) so far as it flows from relief under section 12 of the Finance Act, 1967, in the proportions in which they bore the expenditure giving rise to the relief,”; and

(b) by the addition at the end of subsection (6) of “or under section 12 of the Finance Act, 1967”.