Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Based on a lot of the commentary I have heard and even some opinion pieces I saw in the newspapers yesterday, I believe it is not fully understood by many of those who write about it or comment on it.

With regard to the comments of the Minister for Finance, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, it is very important to say his term "bonkers and unbelievable" referred to the existence of the marriage bar, which has not existed since 1973 but which was certainly a bonkers and unbelievable rule. It existed not in law but in many employments before that year. People who understand the pensions system will know that any public servant hired before 1995 pays PRSI at a lower rate, the 0.9% rate, and that rate does not entitle any public servant hired before 1995 to the State contributory pension, whether married or single, male or female, marriage-barred or not. It is important, therefore, not to confuse the 2012 change with the marriage bar because they are quite separate issues.

With regard to the changes of 2012, they did not just affect women, they affected men as well. Depending on whose estimates one accepts, the difference is about 60:40. Therefore, women were disproportionately affected. It did affect men as well as women, however, and it is important not to ignore all those men who did not deserve a mention in the Deputy's question. They were also affected by the change.

It is important to bear in mind that going back to the pre-2012 system is not necessarily fair either because it also had anomalies built into it. The most obvious of these was that somebody who paid 20 contributions, on average, got a 98% pension whereas somebody who paid 48 contributions, on average, got a 100% pension. Therefore, somebody who paid more than twice as many contributions got only 2% more in her or his pension. If a change is to be made to these rules, it should not be made in isolation because all one would do is throw up new anomalies and injustices. As a Government, we do accept there are anomalies in the system, the averaging one being the most obvious in that regard. Again, it is separate from the 2012 issue.

The Government believes any changes need to be carefully considered. They should not be done in isolation but comprehensively so as not to create new injustices or new anomalies. We should understand the full costs. We should answer the question of retrospectivity and whether it would apply to people who are already retired or just to people who are retiring now. We would need to understand who may gain and who may lose out from any change in the rules. Sometimes changing the rules can cause people to lose out as well as gain. We would need to profile the individual loss and we would also have to look at the impact on poverty. We should bear in mind that pensioner poverty among men in Ireland is higher than it is among women, which is something that often goes unreported.

A lot of work has been done in this regard by the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection. The first part was the publication of an actuarial review of the Social Insurance Fund because any money that is paid out from the State pension, contributory, has to be paid in from the fund so one would have to work out how additional money would be raised for that fund. The actuarial review is completed and will be published quite soon. The Minister, Deputy Regina Doherty, will soon publish a detailed document on the total contributions approach for public consultation. It is the new approach we want to move to, whereby everyone's contribution is counted and it does not matter when one makes them; what counts is the total number one makes throughout one's working career. That would also provide a generous disregard for those who took time out to look after children or disabled people in their home. The response should be comprehensive, not piecemeal.

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