Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

The process for determining Ministers' pay rises should be handed over to the system that governs the pay of TDs, so that they are within the public sector process. Does the Minister agree that in view of the culture of greed with regard to bonuses which has so infected the international private banking sector, determining Ministers' salaries by comparison with the private sector whose workers are immersed in the bonus culture, does not make sense? That is why the moral authority of the Government is in danger. Why does the Government not just give up these increases and provide moral leadership and authority on this issue? The level of these pay increases is totally unjustified.

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