Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)

As the Tánaiste said yesterday, bonuses are indicative but all the literature previously available on bonuses state that they are performance-related and reward for outstanding performance and excellence and that they are not automatic.

Will the Minister clarify who, in the upper echelons of the public service, is affected by his and the Government's approach? County managers, directors of services and senior executives in the Health Service Executive all have bonus arrangements. The Government indicated, when it introduced the various emergency financial arrangements, that the bonuses had been brought to an end and that, therefore, they had already been stopped by Government as surplus excess payments which would be made in good times to reward very good performance. That is what the reports and the replies to parliamentary questions on bonuses, since they were first introduced, suggest.

The Minister will understand that more junior public servants, many of them now taking home less than €500 per week, feel very aggrieved that special arrangements have been made for people who, although they are not necessarily hugely well paid, are certainly far better paid than people in the lower ranks of the public service who face big reductions as well as big tax hikes.

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