Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour)
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I move amendment No. 15:

In page 11, to delete lines 14 to 19 and substitute the following:

"(4) (a)Where the application to a pensioner of subsection (2) would result in the annualised amount of his or her public

service pension being lower than would be the case if he or she had been on a pension specified in subsection

(1) and that subsection applied to him or her, then subsection (2) shall be deemed to operate, in relation to that

pensioner, in such a manner and by reference to the provisions of subsection (1) (the "relevant provisions"), as

will result in his or her pension standing at the highest it would have stood at, as a result of that operation of

subsection (2) by reference to the relevant provisions, had he or she been on whichever lower amount of

pension produces the most beneficial result for him or her in consequence of the relevant provisions.

(b) In this subsection a reference to a subsection or to the provisions of a subsection includes a reference to the

Tables in that subsection.".

This is a technical amendment. It prevents the anomaly which would otherwise arise for a relatively small number of pensioners, 1,500 to 1,800. The anomaly is that certain pensions, following the Bills public service pension reduction, PSPR, adjustments, could become lower in pay value than certain other pensions which were previously higher than them. The relevant pensions which could be impacted by the anomaly are in respect of persons who retired before March 2012, have a PSPR value above the threshold figure of €34,132 and, more specifically, are in the narrow band of pre-PSPR range of €34,132 to €34,750. In order to ensure that anomaly is removed I am proposing this technical amendment which is not easy to understand - I apologise for that - but I have asked my officials to ensure that nobody is disadvantaged by anything we do.