Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim míle buíochas leis an Aire as an gcur i láthair.

In terms of the last discussion, a heavily dependent foreign direct investment, FDI, strategy is known as a transition strategy for Third World countries to migrate to first world status. This country has, unfortunately, never really moved out of that heavily dependent FDI strategy. It has done so on a basis of a bargain basement corporation tax when we should have been building competitive advantages in education, infrastructure, ICT and all of the other elements of society, which make it attractive for both foreign direct investment and indigenous businesses. This Government has not done that. It has heavily depended on a low corporation tax rate and has left the country exposed to radical changes in other countries' corporation tax, which is going to be a major problem for this country in the future. While FDI is good, we need to develop the indigenous sector. We need to build a section of the indigenous economy, the mittelstandsector, of large indigenous enterprises that are able to compete internationally. That has not been done, unfortunately.

I want to ask the Minister about the salary of the Secretary General of the Department of Health. Many people still cannot get their head around what a 45% increase in the salary to €292,000. That is at a time when half a million people have been made unemployed, and when hundreds of thousands of people have been pushed into poverty. Also, as the Minister mentioned, deficits are being run year after year and this country has been taking on massive national debt. That is a warning light for many people. A second warning light for people was the Government statement that the salary was created for a global recruitment process. What do we know at the end of that global recruitment process? In all of the Departments in all of the world, where was the candidate found? In the Department where the individual already works. The third warning light is the process. I mean that the Secretary General was in a particular Department for ten years. A decision was made within that Department, which I understand - please correct me if I am wrong - was reviewed by that Secretary General. That same Secretary General was then moved on an interim basis into the Department of Health and then won the recruitment process that came with a new salary. Can the Minister stand over that process? Can he stand over the largesse of that salary when the Irish economy is being stuffed by the Covid crisis?