Clare Daly (Dublin North, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

The cat is clearly out of the bag and we are now dealing with an open crisis. As Deputy O'Dea noted, however, it is not unexpected because we knew this day would come. Some 400 of these schemes have already closed over the past five years and 300 out of the 900 existing schemes have failed to meet existing standards. What this means in reality is that the reasonable expectation of tens of thousands of workers to a certain standard of living on retirement has been ripped from underneath them. What is the Government going to do about this? The delayed reaction in changing the order means that when these schemes wind up the pensioners will get everything and those still at work or making deferred contributions will get nothing.

Furthermore, many pension schemes are using the current crisis to get out of existing commitments. Examples of such schemes are the ESB and Aer Lingus. The ESB's pre-tax profits increased fourfold last year to more than €300 million. Its chief executive earns in the region of €400,000 and his predecessor earned approximately €700,000. Despite stating it cannot honour the commitments given in the ESB pension fund, it paid out a dividend. Similarly, Aer Lingus is going through a huge crisis involving thousands of workers.

There was a 40% increase in operating profit this year, with record numbers of passengers being carried, yet Aer Lingus says it cannot contribute to the pension scheme. This is not good enough. Some of these schemes are in trouble because of inappropriate regulation - which successive governments have stood over - as well as asset stripping by some of the companies and flawed accounting practices. What we want to know is what is the Government going to do to protect the livelihoods of these tens of thousands of pensioners.

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