Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

Last week, the Taoiseach warned here about the danger of spiralling wage costs and a wage price upward spiral. Does that include Secretaries General under this Government? One such civil servant has now got two pay rises in the past four months. His wages have jumped more than €80,000 to almost €300,000, which is almost as much as those of the President of the United States. He got a 36% raise, while low-paid public sector workers are told to make do with 1% and private sector workers have to gear up for industrial action, just to fight for a raise above the rate of inflation. How can the Taoiseach justify this gross inequality? Will he act to cut the bloated salaries of those at the very top of the Civil Service or, at the very least, will he support similar rises for ordinary workers across both the public and private sectors?

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