Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I fully appreciate the case being made by Deputy Mitchell, and it is a fair and reasonable one, but it is very difficult to disaggregate pensions into the proportion that is transferred-in. As she is aware, because of the vulnerability of many private pensions, for example, in academia, most of them have now been transferred into the State and most of them are in deficit. Should somebody have exempt a portion of their pension which they happened to have paid in before it was subsumed into the State pension, it would be extraordinarily difficult. We cannot have individual cases. We have to have a general application of a rule such as this one. While I am mindful of what the Deputy has said, the general provision that has gone on always is that where the State takes on the payment of a pension, it is treated as if it was accrued through State contributions, regardless of what was brought into the equation.

I will reflect further on what the Deputy has said. As she will know, there is provision in section 6 of the existing legislation for individual anomalies to be addressed, and that provision has been replicated in the provisions I will bring before the House later this evening, which, if an anomalous situation arises, will allow me, as Minister, to make an order and an exemption. That is an important provision to have. I will reflect further on what the Deputy has said but I am mindful of the general application of rules like this in that it is very difficult to establish precedents that do not have wide application subsequently.

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