Taxes Consolidation Act 1997 section 165

Group dividends

Section 165 allowed dividends paid between Irish-resident companies within a 51% group, or between a consortium-owned trading or holding company and its consortium members, to be paid without advance corporation tax (ACT) and without an associated tax credit becoming available to the recipient.

• The relief applied automatically where the payer was a 51% subsidiary of the recipient (directly, or through a common Irish-resident parent), or where the payer was a trading or holding company owned by a consortium that included the recipient.
• Qualifying dividends were treated as not being distributions for ACT purposes, so no ACT was payable and no tax credit was available to be paid out to the recipient.
• The paying company could elect in writing to disapply the section for specified dividends, but only if the election was made before the ACT due date for the period and the ACT was actually paid.
• The section was repealed by the Finance Act 2000 in line with the abolition of ACT, with effect from 6 April 1999 for income tax and for accounting periods commencing on or after that date for corporation tax.

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