Seanad debates

Thursday, 26 March 2009

Pension Provisions

 

3:00 pm

Photo of David NorrisDavid Norris (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Mansergh. This is a rather appropriate matter for the Minister of State to take because I know he has a distinguished academic career and is sympathetic to the work undertaken by universities.

On 2 February this year, the Government announced a pension levy that would affect all public servants. I am not sure if this was to celebrate the 127th birthday of the great writer James Joyce but its impact on certain aspects of post-doctoral research is very negative. I have been made aware of this by a number of individuals in this area.

This is not entirely unlike a case in respect of which I was successful some years ago. A blind student was awarded a fellowship and grant in order to pursue a PhD in history. A very mean mechanism was engaged in whereby the value of that scholarship was subtracted from the blind person's pension, thereby making it impossible for the person to continue with his research. I was successful in this case and hope to be so again today.

I understand the levy will be applied to the personal remuneration of all college employees, regardless of contract or grade, from 1 March. The Government's argument was that this would compensate them for the alleged advantage of public sector workers in terms of security of employment and pension benefits.

A number of points need to be made regarding the anomalies affecting researchers. Researchers do not enjoy any of the benefits enjoyed by public sector workers, nor do they receive any overtime pay, despite the fact that a great deal of their work is done at night, after normal hours and at weekends. Most researchers are on fixed-term contracts with no guarantee of renewal. There are no defined pay scales and salaries are at the discretion of their supervisor rather than the college or Government. In other words, the instability of employment typically prevents them from enjoying the benefits of pension contributions over the longer term.

I remember very well when the Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest Bill 2009 went through the House — it was very recently. There is a clause in section 8 of that legislation that permits the Minister to exempt a group or class of employees on the basis of specific conditions of employment that distinguish them from other classes or groups of public servants. I have and will continue to establish the fact that the individuals to whom I refer comprise a distinct group upon whom a clear injustice will be perpetrated.

Until recently contract researchers were not allowed access to their own pension records associated with their employers' pension schemes despite the provisions of the Protection of Employees (Fixed-Term Work) Act 2003. As a result of their not having such access or making certain payments, many are now being required to back-pay employee payments for the period during which they were denied access. They did not have information on what they were supposed to pay, yet, when they eventually received it, they were required to back-pay. In other words, they are paying pension contributions on the double and now have further difficulties because of the new pension levy.

Researchers whose programmes are funded by industry or the European Union make full economic contributions for their pensions. The employer contributes at the rate of 20% while the employee contributes at the rate of 6.5%. The Government is not contributing to the pensions but is taking money from them.

In addition to this, most research projects are of limited duration. As a result the researchers will never be in a position to accumulate the years of service necessary to take proper advantage of the pension scheme. I will give an example of someone who was in touch with me who is the recipient of a Health Research Board, HRB, post-doctoral research fellowship. The main point of the fellowship is to provide support for outstanding post-doctoral researchers who wish to consolidate their research skills and make the transition from post-doctoral research training to independent researcher. To receive this type of prestigious award the proposed research project must clearly demonstrate the potential to have an impact on the health service, the needs of patients, health practitioners and the public.

The particular proposal I am discussing was peer reviewed at two different stages by highly qualified and respected peers of international and domestic origin. Each year the Health Research Board awards six to eight fellowships to proposals of merit to individuals in various research institutions throughout Ireland. This is exactly the type of work we want done in universities and the type of intellectual investment we want to attract from outside the State. We are acting to inhibit it by the imposition of financial strictures upon these people.

On top of this is a serious anomaly. People who do this research work in Trinity or other national universities such as the constituent colleges of the NUI are subject to the levy. However, this does not affect people in the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland who receive exactly the same post-doctoral fellowships, have gone through the same peer review process and have demonstrated the potential to have an impact on the needs of patients and all of the other qualifications. They are not subject to it. Here is a classic contradiction. One group of workers is included in this penal scheme and another receives exactly the same remuneration, grants, awards and fellowships but is exempt simply by virtue of the fact that they are involved in another institution. This is clearly absurd.

I ask the Minister of State to use the facilities he has under section 8 of the quoted Act to review the situation positively. The vast majority of researchers are paid by various funding authorities and they administer the grant money based on peer review recommendations. Who gets funded for scientific research is not and never will be voted upon by the Oireachtas. Essentially, this Bill imposes a special tax on researchers who work in certain institutions but not in others. This appears to be unjustified and unsustainable.

In the interests of the development of intellectual resources and research which is not pure academic research, although there are aspects of this involved, but which will be of benefit to the country, patients and the health services, as is clearly demonstrated, and which involve small amounts of money, I ask the Minister of State to take action to protect this valuable intellectual resource and not to subject people engaged in this to a penny-pinching exercise.

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