Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)

First, a warm word of welcome to the students from Inver College, Carrickmacross, County Monaghan. It is the alma mater of Deputy Matt Carthy, so they have a lot to answer for.

The Government is all over the place as to what will happen with the €430,000 salary of NAMA CEO Brendan McDonagh when the agency is wound up at the end of this year. One arm of the Government does not know what the other is doing, and there has been contradiction after contradiction. When the Government’s plan was to appoint Mr. McDonagh as its new housing tsar, the Taoiseach told the Dáil repeatedly that he would retain his €430,000 salary in the role. The Taoiseach was adamant that this would be the case and that it would not cost the taxpayer any additional money because Mr. McDonagh would be seconded and the salary was already being paid from the public purse. However, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, then directly contradicted the Taoiseach. He told us Mr. McDonagh would not retain the eye-watering salary on returning to his role within the NTMA. He said that only a specific number of NAMA executives will retain their terms when the transfer of personnel takes place. Then we had the Minister for public expenditure, Deputy Jack Chambers, in the middle of this fiasco. This is where it gets very Fianna Fáily. As Minister for Finance, he drafted the legislation making it clear that all NAMA executives would go to the resolution unit in the National Treasury Management Agency and that all of them would therefore retain their pay and conditions. This must include Mr. McDonagh and his €430,000 pay packet. The Minister will recall that the officials who appeared before the Oireachtas finance committee in September were very clear that Mr. McDonagh would be retaining his salary. Therefore, the labyrinth of contradiction prompts people to ask what the hell is going on here. People catch the stink of something rotten.

Of course, there has not been a peep from the Government on the fact that Mr. McDonagh, its once-preferred candidate for housing tsar, is renting out a house in Dublin for €10,000 a week in the middle of a housing crisis.

The Government is desperately trying to save face and scrambling for cover because at the heart of this controversy is the instinct of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to keep political insiders onside, to preserve the way things work and to feather the nests of the golden circle. The Government’s big problem is that nobody trusts Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to tell the truth. It was caught fibbing about housing delivery figures during the election. The Minister was in the middle of that. It was caught out with the false election promise to provide an extra €1 billion on water infrastructure and it has spent the past few months moving heaven and earth to protect its grubby deal with Deputy Michael Lowry. When it does business by misleading it cannot really blame people for not believing a single word that comes from the Government’s mouth.

Tá an Rialtas seo trína chéile maidir leis an tuarastal €430,000 do cheannasaí NAMA. Tagann gach ráiteas nua salach ar an ráiteas roimhe, agus tá an Rialtas ag iarraidh dul i bhfolach.

The Minister drafted the legislation that will allow Mr. McDonagh to keep his jaw-dropping salary. He has it down, in fact, as priority legislation. I will ask straight questions and hopefully the Minister will give straight answers. Who is telling the truth about Mr. McDonagh’s €430,000 salary? Is it the Taoiseach or is it the Minister for Finance? Can we have some honesty from the Government?

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