Mr. Shay Cody:

To put it simply, if the allowance is paid to everybody, broadly, the unions would argue that it is core pay. On the other hand, there are allowances that are paid to people for a particular duty, skill or task that they undertake and which do not involve large amounts of money. One would not argue that is core pay for a category or a grade but, as accepted at the start of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform initiative, there are many allowances that are considered to be justified because people are doing something for it. The fact that an allowance is not necessarily core pay does not mean one can click one's figures and do away with it, as it may have originated in a person's performance of a duty over and above what was expected of his or her colleagues. Clearly, this is a large area. The list contained in the Department's announcement, particularly for the education area, shows large blocks of allowances which are paid largely across the board. I imagine my colleagues in the teacher unions will argue trenchantly that they are an unusual way of building up the standard remuneration package of teachers.