Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

To be clear, I do not believe that at any stage I have ever said the changes were wrong, and if I have than I would like to correct it if the Deputy's understanding of what I said is not true. There is nothing wrong with the band changes and the averaging system that was introduced by this House in 2012, in the Government's opinion. The change gave rise to an anomaly that currently affects some 42,000 people. This is what I shall address. At no stage, however, have I ever said that the introduction of the bands, or the averaging system that arose from those band changes to the calculations of pensions, was wrong. There is a difficulty with the fact that men and women who had longer working lives than other people are receiving less payments, even though they might have had similar contribution histories. That is wrong, it is an anomaly and is what we are going to fix. I am not at liberty to share the details of the proposals, as they must go to Cabinet. I will bring the proposals to the Cabinet sub-committee tomorrow, and if I can get approval tomorrow it will go to the full Cabinet committee on Tuesday. As I have agreed with Deputies Brady and O'Dea before Christmas, I will publish that report on Tuesday regardless of the outcome and whether I get what I am looking for or not. I reiterate that there is a Cabinet sub-committee meeting of the economics portfolio tomorrow afternoon and I will propose a solution on the pensions changes to the committee tomorrow. If they give me the nod - for want of a better word - then I will bring the proposal to the full Cabinet meeting on Tuesday and we will have a conversation thereafter on that.

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