Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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On 26 July last Dr. Constantin Gurdgiev - and he will have to excuse me if I have pronounced his name wrong - authored a commentary on the Forfás annual report. He was quite damning about the way Forfás divides its expenditure and concluded his analysis by saying that "less than 12.65% of the organisation grant actually went to fund its activities". He said that €43.5 million was spent on pensions, €1.4 million was spent on what he termed "wasted rent", a matter we have previously discussed, and that such expenditure does not give the taxpayer "confidence in getting value for money". He continued by quoting a senior science body head in Ireland as saying:

I was gobsmacked to see this figure. I wonder how much of the country's so-called ... 'science' budget goes on pensions? This is not to begrudge retired public servants their entitlements, but we should be transparent about what we spend.

We need to be careful what we spend on activities as opposed to just meeting wage and pension costs. I shall give the chief executive officer an opportunity to respond.