Michael Mullins (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I agree with a great deal of what Senator Jim Walsh stated about benchmarking in the public service and the need to examine the salaries, rates of pay and allowances of everyone in the service, from politicians right down. The country is seriously broken and there is a massive deficit between income and expenditure. Unless we bite the bullet now, we will be obliged to grapple with this problem for many decades. I was alarmed by a report in one of this morning's newspapers on the operation of a supplementary payroll system at Tallaght Hospital between 2005 and 2010. Under the system in question, huge salary top-ups were given to various individuals who worked at the hospital. They ranged from ¤25,000 to ¤249,000 in the five year period in question. One individual's salary of ¤802,000 was topped up by ¤225,000. There is no documentation available by means of which it might be possible to explain the rationale for these payments. That is the broken system the Government is trying to fix. There is a need for calm among public service and other unions as we try to come to terms with the country's appalling financial situation. If the case to which I refer is an example of what happened during the Celtic tiger era, heaven knows what else is hiding underneath the surface about which we do not yet know.