Mairéad Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is an interesting point. I am sure that many people, when they look at the salary scale, would have a view on this. We need to admit there was a lot of outrage over the increase. When people note that the Taoiseach is on a lower salary than the new head of the Department of Health, they will be quite astonished.

The Taoiseach made an interesting point on attracting people into the sector. We have had many a debate on this with various Ministers. An interesting point that keeps cropping up is that we need to be able to attract international talent. We have seen that only three of the 23 applicants were international. What really shocks people is that it turns out we have somebody who was working for the State who was more than capable of doing the job and more than willing to take it. The individual even waived the salary increase. Therefore, it is quite clear the massive increase, of €81,000, was not in fact needed.