Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

This sense of entitlement among the latter means their salaries have to be topped up by raiding funds donated by the public to provide services for people with disabilities and sick children, as well as raiding the shop at Crumlin children’s hospital. Of course, these same individuals also expect hugely inflated pensions when they leave their positions. This sense of entitlement we have seen exposed in the CRC scandal and top-up payments for hospital executives.

They did not lick this sense of entitlement off the stones.

According to Social Justice Ireland, the pay of Ministers increased by €1,500 a week between 1986 and 2011. The former Taoiseach, Mr. Brian Cowen, walked away from the mess in which he had left us with an entitlement to €310,000. In addition to his Deputy's and Minister's payments, he received a lump sum pension payment, a termination lump sum and a termination payment. Of course, he was not the only one to do so.

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