Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The public are growing weary of all the waste, the cost overruns and everything else. I call on the Tánaiste to put in place an immediate review of the expenses in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, especially relating to press secretaries and advisers. Information provided to me in responses to parliamentary questions has shown that €6.5 million has been spent in the past two years as a result of Ministers employing special advisers and media advisers - in other words, spin doctors - yet the Government is telling the nurses it cannot pay them. Some €6.5 million is being spent by the Tánaiste's ministerial colleagues sitting beside him on spin doctors, press secretaries and advisers. It is an outrageous sum of money. I want the Tánaiste to carry out a review and instruct the personnel officers in the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform to issue a policy to the effect that these cannot be appointed willy-nilly whenever they wish, bring in their friends in the press and cosy up to them.

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