Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)

For many of those private sector workers who have pensions, the turmoil in financial markets over the last year has seriously affected the value of their pension schemes.

The greatest tragedy of this recession is joblessness. Every day, workers in all our communities are losing their jobs. Each day last month, 1,000 workers became unemployed. Many others are maintaining their jobs only by taking large cuts in their pay. Public servants have secure jobs and will continue to retain relatively generous pensions at a time of great upheaval in the Irish economy. The deduction decided by the Government is a reasonable contribution by the public service to the measures now required to tackle our budgetary problems.

On the issue of banking, raised by Deputies opposite, the Government is tackling the problems surrounding the financial system. There is no question but that the inappropriate and highly suspect actions of certain individuals and institutions have significantly undermined our reputation as a financial services centre. The public is understandably outraged by these actions. There is also no doubt that our regulatory system has proven inadequate, as it has in many other countries. A reputation that has taken us years to build up has been significantly impaired in recent years and months. It is my intention to bring forward proposals for reform of the regulatory system as a matter of urgency. A new chief executive of Bank of Ireland will be appointed within three weeks and a cap will be imposed on the new executive's salary.

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