Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Question 6: To ask the Taoiseach the projected cost to his Department of the implementation of the recommendations of the review body on higher remuneration in the public service; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29745/07]

Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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Question 7: To ask the Taoiseach the posts within his Department, the Attorney General's office, the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Central Statistics Office, that will qualify for the recent increases recommended by the review body on higher remuneration in the public service; the estimated cost of implementation of the increases to the personnel concerned; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [30823/07]

Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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Question 8: To ask the Taoiseach the estimated cost to his Department of the implementation of the recommendations of the review body on higher remuneration in the public service; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [30969/07]

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 6 to 8, inclusive, together.

The Government decided the increases for political officeholders will be implemented on an extended basis, with 4% in September 2008 and half the balance in both September 2009 and September 2010. The officeholders concerned are myself, the Government Chief Whip, Deputy Tom Kitt, the Minister of State at the Department of the Taoiseach, Deputy Roche, and the Attorney General. The incremental costs arising are nil in 2007, €10,410 in 2008, €42,545 in 2009 and €76,493 in 2010.

The posts within my Department which have qualified for the increases recommended by the review body are those of the Secretary General, five assistant secretaries, my programme manager, two special advisers and the Government press secretary.

The posts within the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions which qualify for the increases are the Director of Public Prosecutions, the deputy Director of Public Prosecutions, the chief prosecution solicitor and the professional officer grade II.

The posts within the Office of the Attorney General which qualify for the increases, excluding the Attorney General, are those of the Director General, the chief Parliamentary Counsel, the first Parliamentary Counsel, the deputy director general, five advisory counsels, grade I, and four Parliamentary Counsels.

In the Central Statistics Office, the Director General and two assistant director generals will qualify for the increase.

The pay increases will be implemented on a phased basis, over 18 months, as follows, 5% from 14 September 2007, the date of the report, or where the total increase is less than 5%, the full increase from that date, half the balance from 1 September 2008 and the remaining balance from 1 March 2009.

The estimated costs of implementation of the increases for the personnel concerned are set out in a table which I will circulate with the Official Report.

Approximately 1,600 public service posts are covered by the report. The level of increase varies from group to group and in several cases, no increase has been recommended.

The review body's recommendations are based on salary levels in comparable posts in the private sector. The salaries recommended are based on the lower quartile of private sector salaries and have been discounted by 15% to allow for the value of public service pensions relative to the private sector.

Neither I nor any of my Ministers has any involvement or in any way influences the workings of the review body. It has been the policy of successive Governments to accept the recommendations of this independent agency since its establishment in 1969.

Estimated costs of the implementation of the review body on higher remuneration excluding any general round increases awarded to staff during the period.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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One matter that has stuck in people's craws is the method by which this recommendation has been accepted by the Government. The Economist recently produced a table showing that the Taoiseach is the highest paid Head of Government position in the western world. It is higher paid than that of the offices of the US President, the German Chancellor and the British Prime Minister. For a country with a population of 4.5 million, people are asking why the Government could take on these pay recommendations, particularly when there are concerns about the economy, loss and lack of confidence in it and pension provisions.

What positions in the private sector were those of Ministers compared to for these massive increases of €36,000 to €38,000? I admit they will not be accepted until 2010. However, how was a comparison arrived at that makes the Taoiseach the highest paid political leader in the western world and all his Ministers behind him accepting a €38,000 pay increase when workers are being asked to tighten their belts? Is it because the Cabinet has become so far removed from what is happening on the street?

The nurses had two serious issues prior to the general election concerning a percentage pay increase and a shorter working week. They were told the benchmarking process would deal with them. When they entered the benchmarking process, they were informed it could not deal with these issues.

The Taoiseach has set up a position where the next pay talks will be very controversial and difficult. Benchmarking, supposed to be the panacea for the nurses' particular problems, did not turn out that way. Despite the publicity of putting the increases aside until 2009 or whenever, the Cabinet has accepted these pay increases without any performance-related audit.

The other night on national television, the Minister of State at the Department of Health and Children, Deputy Devins, admitted he did not know how much money was allocated to the HSE for mental health care and was not in a position to get answers from it concerning this. Only recently, there was an unfortunate tragedy in which a young man was stabbed 80 times by a person who on three occasions sought and could not get admission to a psychiatric hospital. Due to a debate on a national radio programme, a person put up €100,000 for an operation for a young girl from County Cork, despite the existence of the National Treatment Purchase Fund.

What comparator was used to recommend the pay for the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste and Ministers increase by €36,000 to €38,000? Why was no performance audit built into these increases? Will the Taoiseach accept that by trying to get away with this, the next round of pay talks will be exceptionally difficult?

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy made a number of points. I think I answered a lot of this in a Question Time back in November. I think Deputy Kenny knows most of the answers to the questions he has asked. There has been a review body for higher public servants, the Judiciary, the Garda Síochána and other senior positions, covering approximately 1,600 people, for the past 40 years. It used to report every five years. The last report, which was implemented, was in 1997. The Deputy's own Government made a decision to implement it. The increases were not very big. That was implemented the following year by a Government that I led. All of the increases over the 40 years have been implemented. They are phased by the Government, which is a practice that has been followed.

The same has happened in this case. The review body, which is independent of Government, examines and outlines its report. It has outlined the report. It has given the facts itself. It has outlined in detail the comparables and how they operate. The last benchmarking report was five years ago. The last report on this, was more than seven years ago. When it is implemented it will be ten years. It is double the length of the benchmarking report. That is a considerable factor. That apart, the increases recommended by the review body average 7.3%. They range from a number of posts, which receive no increase, to one post the pay of which was increased by 36%. That was the manager of Dublin City Council. For approximately half of those covered, the increase is 5.5%. They are Civil Service assistant secretaries and related posts, including university professors.

The Government decided to phase in the increases over 18 months. That was all of those increases. It decided to implement the part relating to it over a three-year period and not to pay anything until a year after the report was published. The review body's recommendations are based on comparison of the public service posts with posts in the private sector with comparable levels of duties and responsibilities. The recommendations are based on the lower quartile of the private sector rates. They have been further reduced by 15% to allow for the superior value of public service pensions relative to the private sector. Regarding members of the Government and other political officeholders, the review body considered that direct comparison with the private sector was not appropriate and that the salaries of senior public servants were a more relevant comparator.

It did not compare them with comparable posts in the private sector because it would have been too high. Any of the quartiles that were taken would have put my salary up at €600,000. I did not need that, I can tell the House.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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The Taoiseach would have been in trouble then.

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I would. It did not do that, thank God — and I would not have taken it. It related increases to private sector posts. In its only reference to my post, it stated that the Chief Justice should not be paid more so it put my salary at exactly the same as the Chief Justice. That was the comparable point — that the Chief Justice should not earn more or less that the Taoiseach. Whether it is right or wrong, I am just saying this is the job it did. It compared other posts. It did that independently with actuarial advice, using Hay Management Consultants.

The last review is now already ten years ago. The next review will probably end up in 2011 to come up in 2012. In fairness to the political system, it will not be a matter of concern for me then. The political system has been more than fair. The parliamentary question tabled by Deputy Mansergh showed the level of people in the private sector in the quartile that were way above this. That ran to several thousand of people. I accept there are pressures and that the November figures were not as good, which is why we put it back by a year and then phased it over three years. I do not think the Government has done anything other than take a reasonable view based on an independent report.

The implementation of previous reports was phased and this one is phased. We have never had as long a gap as the one leading up to this report — all of the others were five years and I think one was six. This one will end up being 11 years in the end. From the point of view of professional politics I do not think it is an unreasonable position. Of course on the benchmarking report, the review body stated that regarding any increase given in benchmarking for politicians, officeholders could not get the same increase. What happens then is that it is netted off. The increase given in the benchmarking report is not in addition to what was given in the review body report. Officeholders will not get that increase.

I will just make one point, which is outside what was asked in fairness to Deputy Kenny. Obviously I am deeply involved in the pay talks. It is not the case that none of the issues affecting nurses was dealt with. It looked at all the grades. There are 21 grades, 17 that were listed plus four grades, where it believed the nurses had a substantive case that justified it and they have been awarded increases under the benchmarking report.

Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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We have had two reports on public sector pay, one by the review body on higher remuneration in the public sector covering, among others, the Taoiseach and Ministers. In his case it awarded an increase of €38,000 and in the case of some departmental secretaries it awarded increases of approximately €60,000. We have a second report for lower-paid people in the public sector, which in many cases does not award any increase at all. Is there not something fundamentally flawed and unfair in a system of pay determination, which results in those who are at the highest level of pay getting very substantial pay increases and those at the lowest level of pay getting no increase at all? Do we not have a problem of low pay? The reply to a parliamentary question tabled by Deputy Ciarán Lynch shortly before Christmas established that approximately 1.5 million taxpayers have an income of less than the €38,000 the Taoiseach will get as a pay increase.

I challenge the idea that public sector pay should be determined by reference to the private sector. What has been happening in the private sector for some time is that those at the top end of the pay scale are going into the stratosphere in pay terms. There are chief executives of corporations and companies being paid more than €1 million a year. It was recently reported that the chief executive of a bank was being paid more than €4 million a year. Surely it is not intended for the public sector to follow that model. If it follows that model those at the higher end will continue to rise and those at the bottom end will have their pay driven down. In any event no comparison of that kind can be made between those in employment where monetary reward is traded off for security of employment and those in much more exposed employment where monetary reward is much higher reflecting that insecurity. I would like to hear the Taoiseach's view on the matter because we are creating two societies — those who are very highly paid and those on low pay.

Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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Broadly in the same vein, how does the Taoiseach respond to SIPTU, which has again pointed out that the trend within the private sector is for senior management grades to secure increases considerably above any relationship to others in middle management and all other worker levels within the private sector? Does he not accept that the broad majority of people and a growing number of people believe it is grossly inequitable and gross hypocrisy for Ministers and senior civil servants in the public sector to have their returns linked to this trend within the private sector, something that represents the greediest aspirations from within the private sector? Does the Taoiseach not recognise that there is great upset and hurt that, at the same time as seeing these recommendations regarding his own position and that of his colleagues, there are calls for pay restraint for ordinary workers? For many it is a case of limited increases not even holding with inflation rates but falling back. That is the reality for many people in employment today. I ask whether the Taoiseach is aware of this real concern. Does he not recognise that by his approach to benchmarking and the return for their worth and their labour to those in the public sector he is perpetuating an inequality and giving complementary endorsement to what is happening in the private sector?

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I am not here to argue about the two systems. The review body dealing with pay for higher public servants and politicians, members of the Judiciary, those in local authorities and semi-state companies was established in 1969. No Government since then nor any of the affiliated groups has seen the need to change that. At the time people such as politicians, members of the Judiciary and senior people were considered to be managers somebody other than themselves, an outside body, was needed to examine the pay of the 1,600 people involved. The benchmarking process emanated from what was total dissatisfaction by the representatives of organised labour and of Government with the system of relativities. It was regarded as a poor system that created significant anomalies and industrial unrest. A better system was called for and the benchmarking system was invented as a result.

I remind Deputy Gilmore that his argument is precisely the argument made by Deputy Kenny against the system at the time. According to many, including Deputy Kenny who was not speaking for himself either, the first benchmarking report which was based on a comparable examination between the public and the private sectors awarded astronomical increases in the public sector, with an average increase of 9%. The increase, which ranged from 9% to 27%, was applied across all grades. It was seen as a gravy train for the public service. This time the increases have not been so large because the tightness in the labour market which was allowed for in the comparable study in 1999 was very different from that existing in 2007. The increases are smaller this time. That is a how the cookie crumbles. Those who set the rules must play the game by them.

Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)
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There are two games though.

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I admire the Deputy's position and I could also make that argument but they were the rules——

Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour)
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It is a fortune cookie.

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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——and the rules have not worked out as good this time as they did the last time. That is the position and if affects politicians and others. As TDs we decided to link ourselves to the principal officer grade and that does not show a 1.9% increase this time for most of the Members of the Oireachtas. That is the system that is in operation and it is considered to be a far fairer and better system.

Deputy Gilmore is correct on one point in that the top quartile in the private sector earns very large and incredible increases in pay. The Department of Finance reply to a question from Deputy Mansergh shows that several thousands of people are on enormous incomes. However, the benchmarking review body only deals with the bottom quartile, the bottom 15%, and it then discounts the pension. I do not think the body is being over-generous to the vast majority of public servants in the way it makes its calculations.