Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Recently the Minister and I discussed the Croke Park agreement in the Chamber. At the time I said I supported the targeted reduction in public expenditure of €300 million. I would go further in that an end goal for me, as a societal rule, would be that there should be no difference between public and private sector remuneration, after adjusting for education, jobs and experience. However, I also said I did not believe it was reasonable at this time to further reduce public sector wages when there was so much non-wage inefficiency that could be tackled first. In his reply at the time, the Minister described this search for non-wage inefficiency as a "con job" and referred to the move to shared services as a "radical change".

The Minister is a highly experienced politician and public representative, who has spent 26 years in the Oireachtas. For me, coming in here new, both the Oireachtas and politics are teeming with waste - unvouched expenses and all sorts of things.

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