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

I am familiar with this issue. Since this Government of Fine Gael and Independents came to office, we have increased the State pension by €15 per week and by €20 per week for those living alone as of January. However, this is a company pension fund. It may well be a State-owned enterprise but it is still a company pension fund. The way company funds work is that during the course of their working life, workers pay into the fund and so too does their employer and investments are made as well with that money. In order to pay an increase from any company pension fund, there has to be enough in the fund to do so. If trustees of a pension fund pay increases that cannot be funded, what happens in the end is that some people end up with no pension at all and we certainly could not have that happening.

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