Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left) | Oireachtas source

One of the major contributory factors is the appalling investment decisions made by the trustees of the pension scheme, whom the Government is seeking to further empower. To put it as mildly and politely as I can, some of the decisions made by those trustees were at best ill-judged, ill-timed and very peculiar. They sold off €1.4 billion of assets as part of a freeze and de-risk strategy at a time when property portfolios were increasing. Properties they sold off at rock bottom prices increased in value very shortly afterwards. Those who paid the price for that are deferred and existing pensioners and those who are still actively contributing to the pension schemes at the moment. That really is not good enough. The reason those groups are being disproportionately impacted upon is because of changes we made to previous legislation. We will be pushing the issue on Committee Stage. It is regrettable that the Government has not done it. I hope the Minister will table amendments in that regard on Committee Stage in order that we can address the issue.

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